Quote:
Originally Posted by cmaxwell
Clearly, there's the obvious after the fact method (which I want to avoid), but I'm trying to determine when you know it's time to get it done. I'm driving a '91 560SEL on the weekends once or twice a month - probably about 200 miles max a month. She has 148,940 miles on her.
After she's been sitting for a bit (usually two weeks at a time), when she starts there's a pinging noise that I've been assuming are the valve lifters or something similar as it usually goes away when she gets warmed up. This morning though, that 'valve' noise has hung around. I drove her about 12 miles this morning and it was still 'pinging' (like that noise from low-octane fuel) when I turned her off.
It suddenly dawned on me (and since I don't know any better) that this might be the timing belt telling me she's ready. Thoughts?
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100k is the recommended milege.
It's quite easy to tell if its ever been changed. Remove one of the valve (cam) covers rotate the engine and look for a master link on the chain. A replacement chain will have one, the factory one won't. It's not the chain you need to worry about the most. It's the upper chain guides. They fail at about 100k. The chain jumps off the cam sprockets and usually blows out one of the cam covers. Since these are zero clearance engines the valves and pistons collide and thats really bad ju ju. There are two lower guides that never seem to fail. (They say) When I did mine (being an anal retentive motor head) I replaced the cam sprockets, crank sprocket, and lower guides. I found one lower guide just as worn as the top ones. Chains and sprockets should always be replaced as a set. They wear into each other.
MTCW. Good luck.