water pump swap without motor mount removal?

[eteacher]

sitting half way in the garage cuz the wife's bug won't fit (washer dryer in the way, don't ask) and since she drives the suv and i'm driving this and i need to get to work tomorrow, just trying to recover from the shock of all involved in swapping the water pump.... according to the utube vid i just found... seriously, can i just reach in and slip off the timing belt, pop out the pump and line everything up and bolt it back or am i seriously lacking the floor jack, the motor mount removal guts and.... well is it doable in a few hours or am i looking at a potential "catch the bus to work" situation tomorrow?

still searching and haven't found alternative. problem is no floor jack. if i have to undo the motor mount (timing belt and water pump replaced recently, just bad pump) just to swap pump i'll have to go buy the jack.

[savethebluths.org]

Originally Posted by eteacher

sitting half way in the garage cuz the wife's bug won't fit (washer dryer in the way, don't ask) and since she drives the suv and i'm driving this and i need to get to work tomorrow, just trying to recover from the shock of all involved in swapping the water pump.... according to the utube vid i just found... seriously, can i just reach in and slip off the timing belt, pop out the pump and line everything up and bolt it back or am i seriously lacking the floor jack, the motor mount removal guts and.... well is it doable in a few hours or am i looking at a potential "catch the bus to work" situation tomorrow?

still searching and haven't found alternative. problem is no floor jack. if i have to undo the motor mount (timing belt and water pump replaced recently, just bad pump) just to swap pump i'll have to go buy the jack.

Sure you can just reach in slip off the belt and replace the pump but you're going to be super pissed when you start your bug up and hear the clashing of pistons and valves.

Short answer is, no. You need to follow the directions provided or take it to a mechanic


If you know what you're doing (sorry but it doesn't look like you do) then its a 3-4 hour job.

Time to get that bus pass or have the wife drive you.

[geniushanbiao]

It might be OK if you do it on Honda or Toyota. However it's not good for VW. Keep in mind that German cars are pieces of scraps and when you service them you have to follow all the recommendations and be very very careful. If you don't follow the recommendations then you are more likely to have to spend a lot more money on it in the near future.

Originally Posted by eteacher

sitting half way in the garage cuz the wife's bug won't fit (washer dryer in the way, don't ask) and since she drives the suv and i'm driving this and i need to get to work tomorrow, just trying to recover from the shock of all involved in swapping the water pump.... according to the utube vid i just found... seriously, can i just reach in and slip off the timing belt, pop out the pump and line everything up and bolt it back or am i seriously lacking the floor jack, the motor mount removal guts and.... well is it doable in a few hours or am i looking at a potential "catch the bus to work" situation tomorrow?

still searching and haven't found alternative. problem is no floor jack. if i have to undo the motor mount (timing belt and water pump replaced recently, just bad pump) just to swap pump i'll have to go buy the jack.

[D2Beetle]

Considering the tight quarters involved you cannot do it that way as there is to much tension on the timing belt.

It is only a four hour job and you can use car jacks if you absolutely had to. Surely you have friends, neighbors and/or relatives that you can borrow car jacks from.

[simonsi]

Originally Posted by geniushanbiao

It might be OK if you do it on Honda or Toyota. However it's not good for VW. Keep in mind that German cars are pieces of scraps and when you service them you have to follow all the recommendations and be very very careful. If you don't follow the recommendations then you are more likely to have to spend a lot more money on it in the near future.

Nonsense, whether Toyota, Fiat, Honda or VW, any TB job needs enough Clarence and the tools, time and skills to do it properly, the NB engine is no worse or better in that regard than any other manufacturer.

[geniushanbiao]

The fact is that I have a friend he has a '01 Honda Odyssey and it already has 200k miles and he never replaced the timing belt and tensioner. I warned him many times and he just says if the belt fails he just junk this mini-van and get a new one because this mini-van was involved in a serious collision and the left back side was serious injured. Another friend has a '97 Toyota Camry 2.2L I4 with 150k miles and he only replaced the water pump in this manner at 110k miles without swapping the belt. He says that since this engine is a non-interference engine that belt fail won't cost him any valve or piston so he would stay until the belt fails. This car is been used for DELIVERY!! However I never heard any German cars timing belt last for more than that. Perhaps my friends who have German cars are relatively rich and they tend to replace them at the recommended intervals but the ones who have Japanese or American cars they tend to risk more. From my experiences I can certainly conclude that NB engines are really worse than those of Honda or Toyota.

Originally Posted by simonsi

Nonsense, whether Toyota, Fiat, Honda or VW, any TB job needs enough Clarence and the tools, time and skills to do it properly, the NB engine is no worse or better in that regard than any other manufacturer.

[simonsi]

Originally Posted by geniushanbiao

The fact is that I have a friend he has a '01 Honda Odyssey and it already has 200k miles and he never replaced the timing belt and tensioner. I warned him many times and he just says if the belt fails he just junk this mini-van and get a new one because this mini-van was involved in a serious collision and the left back side was serious injured. Another friend has a '97 Toyota Camry 2.2L I4 with 150k miles and he only replaced the water pump in this manner at 110k miles without swapping the belt. He says that since this engine is a non-interference engine that belt fail won't cost him any valve or piston so he would stay until the belt fails. This car is been used for DELIVERY!! However I never heard any German cars timing belt last for more than that. Perhaps my friends who have German cars are relatively rich and they tend to replace them at the recommended intervals but the ones who have Japanese or American cars they tend to risk more. From my experiences I can certainly conclude that NB engines are really worse than those of Honda or Toyota.

A clutch of anecdotes don't make data. TB's are a well proven technology now across all manufacturers.

[geniushanbiao]

I just give you one of the several examples that I think best describes what I mean. As a matter of fact I've seen a lot of people running Hondas with timing belt over the specified changing interval and I never heard any tb failures. Even for myself I had 2 Hondas I can tell you. I got a '94 civic with 180k miles in the year 2009 and at that time the water pump's bearing failed and was howling like a lion and leaking like a water tap but the previous owner still run it until it couldn't hold even a drip of coolant. I got it and did the tb&wp swapping and after I took off the water pump I couldn't even turn it with my hands! But the timing belt was still good no missing tooth or anything bad. I asked the previous owner and he didn't even seem to know that the timing belt and water pump need to be replaced! Also in the year 2010 I got an almost junked '02 Honda Accord from my boss's brother with mileage 150k and as far as I know he never replaced the tb and water pump. He was using this vehicle for local restaurant delivery for the whole 150k miles! I managed to do the swapping and the timing belt was still like new and the water pump was not leaking! You may read some Honda forums and you would find that a lot of people are talking about their timing belt ran more than 120k miles without any problems although the recommended replacement interval is 90k-105k regardless of years. This could never happen on VWs and we can't even tell a specified replacement interval for timing belts on VWs. I've heard some tb failures on NB at lower than 80k miles because of aging. This is ridiculous that if VW doesn't know how to make a good timing belt they should migrate to timing chain or make their engines non-interference!


TB is a proven technology but some manufacturers do it good some don't.

Originally Posted by simonsi

A clutch of anecdotes don't make data. TB's are a well proven technology now across all manufacturers.