Timing belt $500+ fix

[cyborgguineapig]

My 2001 Daewoo Lanos is at it again, sadly this may potentially be farewell as I am both tight on $ and 500+ miles away from home. Two nights ago I went out for a quick drive. Upon returning, I was at a light and the daewoo began stuttering. Yelling "wtf" and turning down a sidestreet the woo decided to shut off completely. I went to start up again, it struggled to stay on, went into first gear and made it another 40 feet before it cut out and I rolled it to park for the next two days while I scratched my head. It wouldn't turn back on since then but it would try to turn over. Thinking it may be the clutch switch againhttp://www.daewootech.com/forum/viewtop ... er#p118239 I went to inspect the switch and found it to be lodged in the pushed in position. Managed to unlodge it into its default state, car no longer churned over, just silence. SO, I figured it was a faulty clutch switch, again...

Me and a friend pushed the woo to a repair shop, conveniently located a block and half away. As I suspected, they cannot locate a switch because parts for woo's no longer exist except for junk yards . So instead they tell me they will remove the switch all together and simply override by linking the wires so it will start without the switch. Works as planned, now there is a churning sound again, but no success in getting the car running. mechanic sprays starter stuff, after several failed attempts to fire up engine, I walk over to the front where the mechanic is. He's pulling the snap lid thingy off the engine housing, we all come and look and apparently there is something wrong with the timing belt. The teeth aren't moving when the engine turns but there is spark and gas and battery. He says something like only the bottom cog is rotating...

So, they go telling me about it taking 3+ hours labour to replace timing belt and that it'll cost me $370 for labor + $107 for the initial diagnostic and $30 for the modified clutch switch rewire. So far I'm looking at like $500. Also, the shop said the timing belts they had available from their dealers were 69$. My friend calls up Napa in Sacramento, who has one for $34. We go and grab that knowing that now the mechanic can screw us over indefinitely since the timing belt we just purchased is not under the repair warranty. UGGGGG! The mechanic is trying to act sympathetically but he couldn't even pronounce Daewoo, made me consider giving up hope since he isn't certain a new timing belt will work, and I doubt this is the end of their scheming to squueze more $ off of me than I currently have. The fact that I have a hose and tail light needing to be fixed (myself) as well adds to the frustration. Also, he suggested I buy the timing belt kit, for $180, hell no, so I simply bought the timing belt and will know tomorrow morning if I say farewll to the Daewoo. A cool car to drive and have, shitty though for repairs and parts. I need to come up with $250 from sources just for the stuff mentioned above. I hate the idea of things being fixed half way too and by someone that doesn't know what a Daewoo is in the first place. They told me, a valve could get bent if something else was, damaged, or that it could fail again 2 weeks down the road since I'm only going with the timing belt fix etc etc... Boils my blood, Only 87,000 miles.

[cyborgguineapig]

I have 500+ miles to return home driving as well. Awesome.

[cyborgguineapig]

Some places I am reading about say likely there are bent valves due to a broken timing belt because it is an interference engine. I am really really hoping this is not the case. Since I need to return to Portland, OR to work I doubt I will have the time or place to store it in non native Sacramento. I'm coming to the realization if the valves are bent I have to part with my woo quick If I was at home I could part it out to people on this forum at my leisure. This is a nightmare, any suggestions?

[cyborgguineapig]

Again it's a 2001 Lanos Sport.

[exist3nce]

If the timing belt broke/ teeth got ripped off, you can pretty much guarantee your valves are bent - especially if you tried to keep driving/starting it.

[Trey05Woo]

Unfortunately, there was a lot of misdiagnosis, and wrong information thrown about. Your clutch switch was fine. Since all it does is close the circuit and allow the ignition switch to feed the starter motor, and turn the engine over, well it was working properly. Perhaps it was getting stuck, but this would just allow you to crank the engine without depressing the clutch pedal.

As far as your timing belt goes. Very bad news, the chances of no bent valves is next to none. This is an interference engine, meaning that pistons can crash into the valves if the valve timing is altered. The simple fact you continued to attempt to start it, and the tech continued to attempt to start it, you can be pretty certain your valve train is damaged.

DO NOT get a new belt installed just yet. You will be responsible for the labor even if the vehicle does not start. Ask the technician to use a scope to peer inside each spark plug hole. He will be able to see if valves are bent or not. If he does not have this tool, there are other tests he can do to check if the valves are bent WITHOUT REMOVING the cylinder head. If the guy tries to sell you the ohh I need to remove the head to know if the valves are damaged, tell him thanks but no thanks, and get the car home. Contact another reputable shop, and explain to them the situation. You have timing belt failure, and want to confirm valve damage on an interference engine w/out removing the cylinder head.

Good luck, and hopefully you can work something out. Lanos Sport is a rare vehicle these days as are Daewoos in general. Hate to see it go to the scrap yard

[cyborgguineapig]

Valves are bent. That's confirmed. Leaving it parked at my relatives house deciding to try and fix or to scrap. But I have my train booked for tomorrow and will have to decide. Ends up the real culprit here was the tensioner pulley breaking? as it apparently housed in plastic cover which broke off allowing the rather worn TBelt to get mangled...Or something. Spent a good hour talking with the repair guy over the phone and he went out of his way to help me, he was bummed with a half fixed job and made me an offer on the valve repair when I am ready.

[cyborgguineapig]

Assuming mainly the valves are bent. Should I simply go and buy intake/exhaust valves from ebay motor and a timing belt kit (Tensioner,Idler Bearing, Seals) and pay for the labor to have those all put in? And what of the cylinder head? Does that factor in, do I need that to have my woo back from the grave? I'm up against forcing myself to craigslist the entire car for like $400 after having a long hard talk with my Portland mechanic friend who says I should move on and treat this like putting a dog down. I thanked him for putting sense in me but quickly came back to the question of whether I am getting rid of a car I don't really have to part with. I've seen similar threads related to timing belt disasters on here and just want to know if simply replacing the valves and assential belt mechanisms is enough? It's labor that most of the $$$ goes into, right?

[cyborgguineapig]

[img=http://s23.postimg.org/a0yyl2vnb/243746_10150989232412416_867379842_o.jpg]

[cyborgguineapig]

One last important thing to mention. I WAS able to drive it out of the repair shop half mile away to its current resting spot, just didn't seem to have compression and it was a sad drive for sure. Considering that it wouldn't turn over before the belt and tensioner were put in, is it a good sign that at least it could drive? Doesn't appear I did any more damage driving it that far or further damaged it. worth holding onto? Sorry for so many posts. You can imagine the distraught I'm in.

[Trey05Woo]

Wow! I don't mean to sound negative, but, yea you SHOULD NOT be trying to drive that thing. The valves are obstructing the travel of the pistons/rotating assembly. You risk damaging a piston, rod, or rod bearing, or all of these by trying to operate the engine like this. You further continue to abuse the valvetrain, and possibly cause more damage. Hopefully you got lucky and no further damaged was caused, but STOP OPERATING THE ENGINE!

As far as the idler pulley failure; yes this was the weak link in the timing belt system in most cases. It was random, but most ppl saw failure at about 55k miles on the original equipment. I've seen rare extreme cases in the 70s, or in my case: mine failed at 34k. Regardless, they failed prematurely and would lock up. I have seen them where the pulley actually melted away, and others where the idler just completely exploded. This problem was addressed by daewoo and the aftermarket, and is no longer an issue, and the vehicles usually run into and past the timing belt service intervals these days. Which is recommended at 65k.

What you need to get the car running again: Well every shop has their methods, but I'll tell you how I would proceed if you were my customer. First thing would be to remove the cylinder head and record the extent of the damage to the valvetrain. Bent valves is obvious, but you want to make sure the cylinder head itself is ok, and did not suffer stress fractures in and around the valve guides. Any machine shop can do this for you, and will alert you if you need to go with another unit. Second, I would drop the oil pan, which is very simple on these vehicles, and confirm the status and health of the lower end/rotating assembly. Many would waive this off, but the extra 1 hour or so it takes to do this is cheap insurance to preventing engine failure down the road. Timing belt failure is mechanical failure, and when occuring exposes both the top and bottom end of the engine to stresses not intended to be experienced. I would not buy any parts until you are 100% certain of what needs to be replaced. If the head does need to be replaced a used one from a scrap yard will suffice. Once the damage is addressed, it's a matter of tear-down and re-build.

Parts needed off the head would be:

Timing belt, tensioner, and idler pulley.
Water pump o-ring. The water pump is a major player in the timing belt design. It is almost a sub tensioner as it is adjustable, and is the one responsible for setting the belt tensioner. It might be wise to replace the pump as well. However the O-ring must be replaced.
Head gasket set: needed to reinstall the head gasket and sub-assemblies
Head Bolts: the bolts are throw away, due to how they are torqued. They can only be used once, so must be replaced whenever removing the head.
Crank pulley bolt. Same as head bolts. The crank pulley bolt is also non-reusable due to how it is torqued.

The above is requirement for removal/installation of the cylinder head, and timing belt. Of course, you may need additional stuff per your specific situation (valves, guides, seals, etc).

Good luck sorry for the wall-o-text and hope everything works out.

[Puddle31]

Nice job Trey. Hope I am never in the position where I need that information, but it's nice to know it's there. I'm going with the preventative medicine route having my whole belt/tensioner/pump done every 50K or so. So far so good!