My 2.5tdi v6 BDG needs a new timing belt

[unpricipled]

Hi everyone,

I've not had the car long and I've realised it more than likely needs a new timing belt. Only problem is the VAG specialist I I've spoken to don't have the right tools. Does anyone know of a garage in the North (Manchester, Sheffield, Leeds or thereabouts) that can do a good job of this for me?

Thanks

Paul

[Crasher]

I have the tools as we have done hundreds and I am in Nottingham but it is an expensive two day job to do throughly as until stripped down you don’t know if you will need and accessory drive pulleys and buying them all in prior is costly as one is £285 and genuine only so you strip down, asses and order for the next day in most cases.

[unpricipled]

Good to know although Nottingham would take some organising. I spoke to a tech in a main dealership and he said he'd never done one which doesn't fill with confidence. The Contitech youtube video is interesting and shows a lot of the locking tools needed and what a big job it is. £285 is a lot for a drive pulley, is there something trick about it?

[Crasher]

Thankfully it is a rare BUT increasingly common requirement, it is the whole front bearing bracket and the bearing is for the fan, if it fails it takes the entire system out which wrecks the engine. I am not surprised the Audi tech hasn’t done one, Audi stopped using the system in 2005 and at my local Audi dealer all the hands on spanner chaps don’t seem to be over 30 so would still have been at school when production ended, all the older ones move up into training or management so the old skills get lost.

[Amphitryon]

...Audi stopped using the system in 2005...

What do they use now, instead?

In addition to what you said about technicians moving on from hand on work I wonder for how long main dealers typically work on cars. At a guess I would say they may service it for the first owner, receive it back to sell through their "approved used" scheme, possibly service it for the 2nd owner and then probably never see it again once the 2nd owner has sold it.

[Crasher]

It is chains now and they have become their own particular nightmare as they wear badly and the engine has to come out to do them with a huge pile of expensive parts, it often writes the car off when they fail.

I don’t know what age of car they typically work on as a maximum but I went in there in our old 98 A4 loan car which is quite clean (apart from vandal side scratches) and a couple of managers were walking around it reminiscing! They did the same a few days ago when I went in three to get an urgent part only they had* in a customers modified Golf 1 GTI and they were all over it.

*This was a front of crank oil seal holder for a Golf 7 CRTDI. With the belt off we could see the seal was leaking but TPI did not have it in stock even though it is a common issue and Dordon had hundreds in stock. Additionally this seal is installed from BEHIND the cover and not available as a spare part, it is a complete plastic moulding costing £80 and you have to take the sump off to change it...this was a week after we had serviced it and recommended the timing belt so £200 on top of the timing belt job cost for a seal that has always been a problem but used to cost about £5 to change

[FrenchAudi]

What a pity VW gave up on the Wankel engine after buying NSU. It was wonderful to have a car with no valves and no timing chains (poxy cambelts hadn't even been invented then), which didn't even need oil changes, as the combustion products barely came into contact with the oil.
My engine lasted for years because I didn't dawdle around towns with it, just thrashed it at every opportunity.
What could they have done with another 45 years of development?

[Crasher]

Actually the synchros timing belt came into main stream production whilst the RO80 was still a wet dream in Felix’s pants, 1962 on the Glas 1004, another company destroyed by BMW like Borgward and Rover group.

Another 45 years would have put them where Mazda are with it, stuck at an emissions dead end because all that matters in this world is Co2.

[FrenchAudi]

Actually the synchros timing belt came into main stream production whilst the RO80 was still a wet dream in Felix’s pants, 1962 on the Glas 1004, another company destroyed by BMW like Borgward and Rover group.

Another 45 years would have put them where Mazda are with it, stuck at an emissions dead end because all that matters in this world is Co2.

I'm sure they could have come up with something equally as good a tanks full of pee to inject into the engine

[FrenchAudi]

Actually the synchros timing belt came into main stream production whilst the RO80 was still a wet dream in Felix’s pants, 1962 on the Glas 1004, another company destroyed by BMW like Borgward and Rover group.

Another 45 years would have put them where Mazda are with it, stuck at an emissions dead end because all that matters in this world is Co2.

Not so.

ACTUALLY, the very first NSU/Wankel RC engine ran, and produced measurable power, albeit only in short spurts, on February 1st 1957.
Source: "The Wankel RC engine", R.F Ansdale, Iliffe Books, 1968.