Timing belt auto tensioner - how do you know if it's bad?

[Rob Furniss]

It's off the car and it looks quite old (Rowans car again).
The manual says to apply 98 - 196 nm of force to it by pressing it to the cylinder block or similar and measure the movement - how the hell do you do that?

I've put it in the vice to push it in as need to do this to put a pin/wire in anyway and it was really quite hard turning the lever to tighten the vice up and push the rod in but I got there. Hell maybe I need to work out more but I don't remember it being this hard on my FTO when I did it.
So is it a good sign that it's hard to press in and therefore ok or is it a bad sign or neither?
Thinking I should just get one anyway but we keep throwing money at this engine and I won't know if it's right till I put it all back.

[Rob Furniss]

Can't find anyone local with one, supercheap online is $95 and don't think I will be able to beat that.
Phoned Mitsi just on the off chance, $372.90 and they don't have one in Vic.

EDIT:Thinking about it unless somehow knows for sure and points me in the right direction, i'm thinking the tensioner may be ok.
They are bad when they leak oil right which would then make it easier to push the rod in and it's actually hard to push the rod in which is making me think it's still got it's hydraulic fluid.

[Technikhaus]

I re-used the tensioner on the 6A13, it didn't look to leak at all when compressing it in the vice, and it took quite a bit of effort to compress again.
After that I figured it should be fine...

[Rob Furniss]

I re-used the tensioner on the 6A13, it didn't look to leak at all when compressing it in the vice, and it took quite a bit of effort to compress again.
After that I figured it should be fine...

Thanks mate that's what i'm thinking, if it had leaked the fluid out it would be easy compress right? Pretty simple device.

[Technikhaus]

yeah, I think that's how it works...

[dstocks]

Yeah, but if it fails (which they do when they get older), your timing belt tension is gone and then its valves into pistons. $90 is a lot cheaper than new engine... They are actually supposed to be replaced with the timing belt (although lots of people dont)

[Technikhaus]

In my case, the timing belt looked barely a thousand K's old, and the tensioner didn't look too old either, so I just went with it :p

[Rob Furniss]

Yeah, but if it fails (which they do when they get older), your timing belt tension is gone and then its valves into pistons. $90 is a lot cheaper than new engine... They are actually supposed to be replaced with the timing belt (although lots of people dont)

Hell I don't know what to do now as I can't get one for a few days anyway but you're making sense Dwayne.
If I put it back and then change it in a week or so (assuming this engine is ok) can I just leave the belt on but release tension from it enough and hold it on with bulldog clips then replace the tensioner, re-tension and turn it over by hand a few times? (meaning not having to set the timing up again?)

[Vectose]

Yup, you'll be just fine doing it like that.

You'll be setting the tension with the pulley anyway and that should hold it in place while you remove the hydraulic tensioner.

[Daniel2019]

Yeah as a general rule, always replace tensioner.

[Rob Furniss]

I've got idler and tensioner pulleys just not the hydraulic tensioner, need to see if this engine is goosed or not.

[SchumieFan]

I didn't replace mine when I did the water pump and timing belt, consequently the belt slipped when I replaced the crank angle sensor (manually cranking the motor) and was the source of all my dramas at the beginning of the year...

Now because of that I have a fucked engine mount and the loudest tappets on earth....


Basically.... change the tensioner as it says

[Chebus]

I replaced a water pump and used the same tensioner, no dramas from it so far. But if you want piece of mind, replace it.

[SchumieFan]

It should be replaced every 100,000kms with the belt

[PHIL069]

I didn't replace the FTO one when I did the belt.
Although I did replace the VR4 one.

If it's still hard to compress and pushes out when released it should be good to go.

If the engine works out good just change it in the future sometime.

[SchumieFan]

As I said... my one felt fine and was hard to compress, it worked perfectly fine till I cranked the motor by hand... The tensioner was busted enough to not take all the tension and the belt between front bank intake and the top pulley had slack on it... ala the intake cam skipped.

Replace the fkn tensioner, it's one of the cheapest parts to replace!

[dstocks]

This^^

[Rob Furniss]

Just been down to supercheap and ordered one as i'm now 90% convinced it's knackered.

Last night I tried to tension the pulley which is supposed to be to 3nm but the torque wrench wouldn't click off and the belt looked very tight and pins in the pulley had gone right to the top.
Had a look at the hydraulic tensioner and the pin wash pushed right in so it didn't take much force to do that, this should have been resisting and letting my torque wrench crack off I reckon.
As schumie stated previously his seemed to be stiff but it was knackered and I think this is the same.
I tried it a second time and same result and couldn't take the pin out of the hole.
Is my understanding right or have I done the tensioning wrong in the first place? (pin holes in the pulley at the bottom, special tensioner tool on and torque wrench and lift up from the right anticlockwise (as per the manual).

[SchumieFan]

Yup.. your diagnosis is correct...

I didn't actually use the tensioning tool as there is another way as well - though my old man has one he's giving me when he gets here from his round the world trip (yes he took it with him)

[Vectose]

I have found that the clicking torque wrenches don't seem to want to click where they're supposed to when adjusting the belt, you need to use one of the gauge type ones.

The way I've done several belts so far is tension the pulley until the pin you have inserted moves freely, you need to hold it there for a couple of seconds before removing the pin as the hydraulic tensioner could still slowly be compressing after you've stopped turning the pulley.

Once the tensioner pulley is tightened and the pin moves freely, remove the pin and you're good to go.

I've done 4 engines like this and no problems.