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2005 Kia Rio 1.6L, 91k miles, recommended timing belt replacement interval 105k miles. The spine of the belt didn’t break but it had about 10 teeth sheared off by the crank sprocket’s normal turning force, causing it to no longer drive the belt. The camshafts stopped turning while the crankshaft was still turning at speed, resulting in the following:
The customer did a great impression of the sound it made. Their aftermarket warranty is covering a engine replacement because the belt was not supposed to have been changed until 105k.
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[quote=”Bluesnut” post=146250]Let that used belt break in the near future and guess which innocent party will get the blame if not the legal liability. Word of mouth will be the mechanic botched it and anyone hearing the tale will not hear the “refused service” part of it…..[/quote]
Isnt that the truth! It’s so frustrating that people will blame the tech for everything. It’s our fault the prices of parts and labor are too high. It’s our fault that parts go bad (like we go out back and make them on the spot lol). It’s our fault that we did an oil change and now you have brake noise that wasn’t there before we did the oil change.
And we all know what’s going to happen. That timing belt is going to break at 106000 miles and the warranty company will say sorry it wasn’t done at the proper interval. Unfortunately, I have seen this happen a couple of times.
Do you professionals really get the heat like that? I thought that was only computer technicians that had to deal with that nonsense. I’d fix someone’s computer, didn’t matter what was wrong, and the second anything went wrong, it was my fault, why couldn’t I keep this virus from coming in, why did the hard drive die 9 months after I had it, etc.
I know that feeling and it is annoying.
[quote=”ArtyS” post=146312]Do you professionals really get the heat like that? I thought that was only computer technicians that had to deal with that nonsense. I’d fix someone’s computer, didn’t matter what was wrong, and the second anything went wrong, it was my fault, why couldn’t I keep this virus from coming in, why did the hard drive die 9 months after I had it, etc.
I know that feeling and it is annoying.[/quote]
All the time
we do a oil change or some routine maintinance on a customers car, tell them its got a component that needs replacing because its about to fail (AKA timing belt.) they don’t listen, say they don’t need that replaced…. well they come back later and its like i told you so, just like this right here… i told you so! you needed a new timing belt, still they blame us because we didn’t fix it… makes sense right? issue is someone always has to be to blame.
[quote=”ArtyS” post=146312]Do you professionals really get the heat like that? I thought that was only computer technicians that had to deal with that nonsense. I’d fix someone’s computer, didn’t matter what was wrong, and the second anything went wrong, it was my fault, why couldn’t I keep this virus from coming in, why did the hard drive die 9 months after I had it, etc.
I know that feeling and it is annoying.[/quote]
I had great teachers in my auto tech program. They did a great job of relating real life scenarios like this. Juan taught us “Ever since you”. “Ever since you checked the air in my tires, the car lights on fire during rush hour!” It’s unfortunate that we have to be scapegoats like this; but that’s humanity for you. Some people are legitimately frustrated even if they’re wrong. Some people are trying to play psychology against you to see if they can get you to fix their broken stuff for free because why be a responsible grown up? It’ll never change either.
What I’ve seen of timing belts themselves has been a wide contrast of unbelievable. The one in particular that amazes me most is a 2004 Solara that used to belong to a store manager at the local Sears. I worked in the Auto Center at the time and I was always trying to sell him that timing belt. He bought the car new and we had the entire service history on it. He drove the car from Milwaukee to Madison & back every day and it had 365K on the odometer by the time I met it. He retired in 2014, the car had 395K by then, and he still wouldn’t replace that timing belt. Some of the belts I could sell that made me laugh were the ones where the belt was OK in spite of being sorely overdue, but then the hydraulic tensioner was almost totally bled out from a leak.
A good friend of mine has a 1999 Acura CL 2.3.. .This has a single cam F series VTEC engine. He bought it with 103k miles on it, and the owner stated that the timing belt had just been changed.
Fast forward three years and nearly 50k miles. Buddy is late for a class at the University, and is driving his car much harder than he usually does. And the old timing belt broke with the engine at about 3000rpm. Surprisingly the only damage was a very slightly bent valve in the #4 cylinder.
The pictures of the little RIO engine makes me a bit sick to my stomach…
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