Timing question

[1995 brian]

Ok so i have a friend that has a 97 gsx and he asked me if the timing belt was not tesioned correctly(kind off loose) will it loose power. I didnt want to guess the answer so i rather ask you guys that know. He says that he felt the car had more power before he did the timing belt. So will the timing belt not being tesioned correctly cause the car to loose power? 97 gsx auto.

 

[bryanwheat]

Not unless it jumps time. IF he suspects that the tension is loose than he needs to adjust it properly. He is asking for bent valves driving it like that.

 

[pauleyman]

THe car should run exactly the same after a timing belt job. If it doesn't it is probably out of time and potentially loose as the person doing the job did not know how to check the marks so it's doubtful they knew how to check the tension either. Whether this is your friend that did the job or not the above statement is likely true. If he suspects the tension to be wrong it's a ticking time bomb. Stop driving and fix it. There are countless documents on how to do this.
I've referenced this I don't know how many times. No matter which method a person chooses to install the belt, tension it etc etc etc. These statements holds true no matter what.

Rotate the motor at least six full times until the crank lined up with it's mark. At this time ALL OTHER MARKS MUST LINE UP ALSO WITHOUT EXCEPTION. The protrustion of the hydraulic tensioner must also be EXACTLY to specs. There is a min and a max spec that is allowed. If it's not in this range and/or the marks do not line up the job is NOT done. The reason you rotate the motor at least six times is to line up all the marks again (if you had the marks lined up in the first place it takes exactly six rotations before they all come back again). AND by moving the crank any amount you remove all the slack from the idle pulley side. ONLY then can you check the protrusion of the tensioner. It just so happens six rotations is convenient and accomplishes both tasks. Again, If BOTH items aren't right, the job isn't done. There is NO subjectivity, NO almost, NO good enough, NO it'll loosen up, NO too tight is a little better, NO I think so. It is either on point or it isn't.

Sorry if this is very blunt but after 20 years this is the single most job I've heard screwed up and the most misunderstood job in ANY car repair for any make/model I've ever worked on. I just don't understand how that is so but it is. It's not difficult, it's just very specific as to what is to be done and completely unforgiving if it's done wrong. Hope this helps.

 

[Mansour]

I wouldnt take any chances with that. my timing belt acctually snapped a month ago and now i got some valves bent. probably 1 or 2 ..or 16. and than all you do is ride rough and potentially create a misfire.

bottom line, get it fixed, cuase once this happen you WILL lose a good sum of power

 

[Ozyeclipse]

More like loosing money defenetly sounds like timings off though more than likely jumped time if u reused the tensioner...happened to me before before u buy another belt check ## tensioner+bearing

 

[JusMX141]

The belt slack will always be on the trailing side of the crankshaft. This means unless the belt is ridiculously stretched (generally doesn't happen to timing belts), the distance between the crank and cams will always remain the same...and therefore performance will not suffer.

If the belt is really loose, as you're stating, then you need to give some serious attention to the timing belt before it leaves you stranded with a large repair bill.

 

[Theturdburgler]

Reset the tension before the motor is lost.