Changing the Front Timing Belt

It is absolutely essential that you change the timing belt at least every 60,000 miles. If the belt breaks, the valves will collide with the pistons and then you can say good-bye to your engine. The procedure can be found in AllData. I will just give you a few pointers from when I did the job.

If the water pump has not been done in a while now is a great time to do it. If the pump is recent, you might want to buy a new water pump o-ring to ensure a good seal.


You must remove the crank pulley to do this job. This is a huge pain. The crank pulley bolt should have been installed with Loc-Tite and torqued to >250 ft./lbs. It was necessary for me to use a chain wrench with a 3' handle and a 3' breaker bar to remove this bolt. YIKES! The other option is to remove the radiator etc. and get in there with an impact.

The crank pulley is keyed, but the key is only there for alignment purposes. It has little structural strength, hence the outlandish torque. I torqued mine to 250ft./lbs. and then tightened it some more using the aforementioned 3' breaker bar.

It is of the utmost importance that the crankshaft is spot on TDC. Buy yourself a small mechanic's mirror and use it to site the TDC mark as if the engine were out of the car and you were looking straight down at it.

The manual does not show you how to install the tool . You need to remove the rear camshaft sprocket(make sure to lock the injection pump at TDC with the pin) and I found it necessary to remove the last two valve cover studs. There is a slot in the back of the cam that the tool fits into.

Belt tension: I installed mine too tight and it "howled". I kept on loosening it bit by bit until it didn't howl any more. The VW tensioning tool is over $100. Ouch. I can push/deflect mine 45 degrees with one finger-not trying that hard.

While doing the belt, it would be prudent to change the tensioner as well.

I found it easiest to remove the power steering pump when doing this job. It's only a few easily accessible bolts.