I too have mixed feelings over this issue, on the one hand a well maintained engine's chain *should* last the life of said motor.
The belt will need to be changed at some point and i too would do the job before due for peace of mind.
Some belt engines are a pita of a job though and many hundreds of pounds to have done, whereas some (luckily mine) are a one hour doddle at 90K miles.
Where the cambelt does score well is that you can open the cover on most cars and have a good butchers with magnifier and see the condition of the belt whereas a chain may well look brill but be on it's last legs.
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Had he belt done on my Fabia vrs recently (1.9 VW 130 PD ) and the mechanic gave me the old parts back. The belt looked pristine (4 years 36K). I was told it was a 4 year or 60K change. When said the belt looked ok my chp said ahh but there's the tensioner spring to consider as well.
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I'd rather have a chain than a belt as I've seen far too much catastrophic engine damage caused by premature cambelt failure when I was in the motor trade.
I have a Nissan Almera 1.8 which is a chain driven DOHC engine and there are some reports of chain stretching with these engines but I was having a chinwag with my neighb who owns 2 garages over the weekend, I asked him about the Almera timing chains and he sed he's only seen one or 2 with chain problems but - on high mileage cars poorly maintained.
So, although the recommended oil for my car is 0W-30 syn, I'm gonna stick some 10W-40semi-syn in the critter (mileage 30k)
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The Mazda MX-5 engine (certainly the MK1 version) uses a belt but is a non-interference design.
I understand the reservations about chains. But I still prefer them. Failing that, a non-intefereence design is essential, IMO. I certainly wouldn't by a car that needed a new bet every year or so - not at today's labour costs!
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I don't think 'd ever change a timing chain after a given mileage - keep the oil good and leave it well alone.
Much like a bicycle or motorcycle, if you replace a partially worn chain with a new one it will rapidly wear the slightly worn sprockets and potentially lead to failure sooner than if left alone.
By the time a well worn chain occurs the car's probably worth £200 so a new motor will work out cheaper.
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My very first Mazda 323 (RWD) had chain cam and at start up it rattled like billy ho due to tensioner loosing it's oil pressure over night - got new chain and tensioner - garage said split a link in old chain clip new chain on and wind engine round then fit new link - worked a treat - just changed the old tensioner for new which had a ratchet to stop it returning - My Xedos 9 Miller is belt but non interference.
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I'm superstitious about cam belts. I've had quite a lot of cars and have always done a fairly high mileage. I can also say that I've always ensured that they have been serviced on time and in accordance with the manufacturers schedules.
Despite that, I've had three cam belts snap on me over the years with catastrophic engine damage in each case. Fortunately, these events all occured under warranty. Nevertheless, they were majorly inconvenient given that one instance was at 5.00 pm on Christmas Eve while 500 miles from home, another was in northern France in the dead of night and the third caused me to miss an important business meeting and to have to sit in a motorway service area for hours waiting to be recovered.
In recent years I've been self employed and needed a reliable car. I would find it disconcerting to buy a car with a cam belt to fulfill that brief, particularly as I've developed the habit of running cars to big mileages. In addition to the concern over reliability and the potential costs of a cam belt failure I also would not want to have to fork out large sums to change them on any kind of regular basis.
I recently returned to the establishment and got a job with a company car but I'm quietly pleased to note that it has a chain.
Belts are fine on trousers. Engines should have chains......
;-)
Edited by Humph Backbridge on 19/10/2009 at 23:36
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The same seems to be true with the Corsa. A Corsa site I am member of general advices people against replacing the chain unless its very bad. The reason being is a new chain will soon suffer oil starvation problems like the old ones and like you say a new chain on old sprockets is not ideal.
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The same seems to be true with the Corsa. A Corsa site I am member of general advices people against replacing the chain unless its very bad. The reason being is a new chain will soon suffer oil starvation problems like the old ones and like you say a new chain on old sprockets is not ideal. eh?
where do you and your comrades get the idea that a new chain will suffer oil starvation problems?
i always thought the oil pump pumped oil
i didnt realise these corsa chains generated the stuff
learn something new daily on here
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But the oilways tend to get blocked, if that is not fixed when the new chian is fitted the new chain will just get wrecked due to a lack of oil.
Even lazy oil pumps them selves are often ignored if its not bad enough to put the oil preasure light on.
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so why fit a new chain if its lubrication holed is blocked up
its like just being able to afford a dog but not its food
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Exactly but people have had problems instructing garages to fit new chains but they have not checked why the old chain failed. Sadly many garages don't carry work to the same standard as you would.
The other interesting thing is a lot of garages are just replacing tensioners under warranty rather than the chian itself.
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nothing wrong with doing the silly tensioner bits if the chain is within limits
cant imagine anyone with any sense changing a chain if they can see the reason for its demise is oil starvation though and not fixing the root cause
or am i missing something
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The reason new chains wear in less mileage than the original is very simple.
as a chain wears, it 'stretches' (actually it doesnt, the wear in the moving parts causes slack that creates the effect)
as it 'stretches' it doesnt sit correctly on the gear teeth, causing wear, look closely at the teeth, you will see they become hooked.
it is the wear on the gears that accelerates the wear on the chain.
easiest place to see this, is on a motorcycle... a well used machine often shows this effect very well!
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I was somewhat disconcerted to hear from an RAC patrolman pal that my Nissan Note 1600 was prone to letting it's chain go at about 40K miles.
I think, like Perro, I'll be doing regular filter and oil changes with a thicker oil about every 5000 miles. Got 20K on the dial at the moment...I guess it'll take a while to rack up 5K but I'll do the first change next week.
The Jowett is very basic and it works...duplex chain, 2 chainwheels, no tensioner and unknown to give trouble...a small nozzle from the oil pump aims a jet of oil at the chain all the time..
seemples !
Ted
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Perro, I'm missing something here. How is sticking thicker, poorer quality than recommended oil in going to preserve your timing chain?
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>Perro, I'm missing something here. How is sticking thicker, poorer quality than recommended oil in going to preserve your timing chain?<
+1.
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>>>How is sticking thicker, poorer quality than recommended oil in going to preserve your timing chain?<<<
To be perfectly honest Gordon, I'm in a bit of a dilemma here ... my Nissan main dealer uses Total or Elf fully synth but I'm planning to do an intermediate service and use Castrol.
When I enter my reg. no. on the Castrol site it comes up with Castrol Edge (syn) and Castrol Magnatec (semi)
I wouldn't say (myself) that the Magnatec is "poorer quality" but - I stand to be corrected if necc.
I shall never forget when I purchased a Toyota Hiace once upon a time .... I did an oil change using "The Best" i.e. Mobile 1 ... when I started the critter up next morn., the noise from the timing chain had me reaching for the Valium!, so I drained the stuff out and replaced it with (the then) GTX 20W-50 = no more noise :)
So, I wanna get things right, but I'm not really 100% sure which route to take?
I have heard a very slight 'Rattle' once or twice lately on cold starts (service not due) so I just thought I'd try the ole Magnatec semi-syn but - I would be very interested in yours and others comments on this question.
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Perro, I would think the difference would be in adherence to specification.
Did your Hiace specify very thin fully-synth? If not, then I am not surprised that it sounded terrible. You need a modern engine with close tolerances for them to be appropriate.
But, given your car is supposed to be using nice thin fully synth oil, I would imagine that it would run very nicely on it (my Accord sounds no different from new at 95k miles using only 0-30 fully synth), and might well gum-up oilways and feeds if you use something that is much more viscous than it is designed for.
Just my thoughts, one of the mechanics on here will shortly be along with some reality I'm sure. :-)
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I agree with Gordon. There is no such thing as oil that is too thin or too thick, only having the right oil for your engine.
For timing chain life, I'd be sticking with the thinnest oil recommended by the manufacturer, which is, in fact, what I do. I would ignore what Castrol say, as has been discussed here before, their data is patchy at best, and they only list products they sell, strangely enough.
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I had a similar problem with my Kawasaki ZZR600. As with the car, I'm not fussy about what brand of oil I use as long as it's well known, and meets the spec for the engine. I tend to buy whatever I can get a deal on at the time.
At one service, I used Castrol GPS, which is a 10W/40 semi synthetic bike engine oil, the same grade and spec as the other oils used previously, and exactly meeting Kawasaki's recommendations for this engine. I finished the work and started the engine to be greeted with a horrible timing chain rattle, which continued for about 10 seconds, then went intermittent for maybe another 10 seconds, before petering out completely. This happened on every cold start from that point forward until I bottled it and dropped the oil a few hundred miles later. Refilled with an alternative that I've used before (Rock Oil) and the noise disappeared instantly. It has never returned.
Comparing the grade and specs of the Castrol and Rock, they were absolutely identical, but one caused a timing chain rattle, and one didn't. This was a (then) 20,000 mile engine, which had never gone more than 4,000 miles on the same oil in its life. It has since done another 6,000 miles with no timing chain noise at all.
I have nothing against Castrol oils. I've used them in various car engines over the years and had no bother at all, plus friends have used GPS in their bikes and swear by it, but there was something about this particular engine that just didn't like it.
The filter wasn't a variable - I always use genuine Kawasaki items from the same source (an official Kawasaki dealer).
I still can't explain it.
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I would google Magnatec oil if i was you, it's not liked by a lot of people. I used to put it (10/40 semi) in an old Vectra 1.8 i used to run, and although i had no trouble it did used to gum up the engine a bit. I know it states it sticks to the metal, which it did(thick and treacly when cold) but i worried it might be blocking the oilways
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Yes, well - I take on board what you say Gordon & Oil Burner as there is no arguing with logic but ... I'm still not 100% sure on what oil I'm going to use.
Another van I had - from brand new, was a rather fine VW Transporter with the fuel inj. 2.1 engine, i fed that GTX from new, but one day I decided to try BP Viscostatic, and the next morning the hydraulic tappets just *would not* stop clattering - drained & refilled with GTX = no problemo!
About 7 years ago I had a 204 GLT and I used to get an indie to service it once a year,
when I started the engine next morning, the oil light used to stay on for about 7 seconds or more, so out would come their Vauxhall oil & in would go the GTX = no problemo :)
I can get it into my skull that todays engines are built to much finer tolerances than that of yesteryear but ... ole Mr. chain is sitting there all night, all his lube has drained away into the sump and being a French chain - he needs all the help he can get from Mr. oil, so that was my thinking re: 'Magna' tec but, as comrade prm36 points out - there are some issues with the stickiness which I'll have to read up on before pouring the liquid engineering into my sump.
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Yep, and the thinner the oil when cold, the quicker it gets to work lubricating that chain!
I agree with what you're saying that different oils of the same rating may produce odd results, but I think we both want the same thing: chain protected by the oil as much as possible.
IMO, that is best done with the thinnest oil the manufacturer allows for that engine.
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>>> IMO, that is best done with the thinnest oil the manufacturer allows for that engine. <<<
Yep! and with a bit of rodent-research, I've decided on Castrol (now there's a surprise) Edge 0W-30 which is expensive @ £45 per 4ltrs but ... a hellova lot cheaper than a new timing chain :)
Thanks y'all for 'steering' me away from Magnatec.
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