[alfa] Re: Re:Timing belt life

[George Graves <gmgraves@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I'd like to add my two cents worth to the 'backwards thing'. If you 
find yourself parked on an incline the following basic advice should be 
self apparent: If you park with the nose pointing uphill, leave the car 
IN REVERSE. If you park facing downhill, leave it IN FIRST. The aim 
here is to make sure that if the parking brake gives way and the car 
rolls a bit (hopefully you will have remembered to park hard by the 
curb with the wheels turned INTO the curb -whichever way you are 
facing) the engine will turn in the CORRECT DIRECTION.  Again, not 
allowing an Alfa V-6 to run backwards cannot be too highly stressed 
(especially the 12-valve engines as well as the early 24-valve engines 
built before Alfa redesigned the belt path in 1996).

George Graves

GTV-6

On Dec 14, 2003, at 10:19 AM, alfa-digest wrote:


> Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2003 08:34:00 -0600
> From: "Peter Webb" <webb.p@domain.elided>
> Subject: RE: [alfa] Re:Timing belt life
>
> > Karl Doll has picked me up on the 50,000 mile life of cam belts I
> > mentioned. I
> > should qualify my comments. For reasons I do not comprehend V6
> > 12v Cam belts
> > have an intended life of 50,000, but ought to be changed at about
> > 35,000. The
> > V6  24v cam belts have an intended life of 70,000, but 50,000 is the 
> > usual
> > change time, and whilst these intervals are anything but set in
> > stone, they do
> > cover the vast majority of eventualities. If you want to do them
> > more often,
> > thats fine.
> A couple of things on belts.   Our local expert, Mike Besic, 
> recommends the
> factory belt over the aftermarket belt.   They are reinforced with 
> carbon
> kevlar strips and far less prone to stretch and, more importantly, less
> prone to skip if accidentally rolled backwards.   I just had this
> conversation with him yesterday while he had a Verde in for drive shaft
> replacement.   While tightening the donut bolts the shaft moved 
> backwards on
> him and he could hear the belt jump the exhaust cam.   The fact that 
> they
> can skip with a slight jog of the shaft is scary.  The factory belts 
> are
> quite a bit more expensive than the aftermarket belts.   Personally, I 
> don't
> cheap out on anything for the Verde.   It gets the best of everything 
> which
> has contributed to it being a very reliable, fun car.
>
> Another note on the backwards thing.   I had a situation a while back 
> that
> the required a tow on the Verde.   I specifically requested a flat bed
> rather than a hook.   The driver left the car in gear on the truck.  
> During
> unloading he was about to roll the car backwards off the bed.  Quick
> thinking got me to stop him before he moved it so I could check it was 
> in
> neutral.  It wasn't.  I averted a possible catastrophe.   If your 
> 75/Milano
> ever needs to be towed, make sure it's not in gear when it loaded on 
> the
> truck.   I always request a flatbed truck rather than a front hook for 
> all
> my cars.  I hate the idea of the transmission/transaxle turning with 
> no heat
> or oil circulation.
>
> - -Peter
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