Acura / Honda 3.5 v6 timing belt frustration!

[jimbanville]

2014 Acura RDX with 100k started making common bad hydraulic tensioner noise at start up. Bought the Aisin timing belt kit from Amazon (belt, roller pulleys, tensioner, water pump). Installed it. Only issue I had was rear cam pulley did spring forward 1/4 of a turn, which isn't uncommon. I rotated it back that 1/4 turn to its proper position. Turned engine by hand several times and all timing marks lined up. Drove it. No issues. After a day or so I got emissions warning message. Took it to parts store and their code reader showed ECU fault/timing off. Great! Pulled two upper timing belt/ cam pulley covers off. Marks still lined up. I did notice the tension on the belt on both "outer sides" of the pulleys (the side of the rear pulley closet to firewall and the side of the front pulley closet to radiator) were tight going down to the crank and tensioner, but the section of belt between the two cam pulleys had some looseness that I wouldn't expect, although I'm no authority on how tight the belt should be in that section. I pulled the harmonic balancer and lower timing cover off and timing marks on the crank and two upper pulleys were still in their proper positions. Thinking maybe I was one tooth off, I removed the tensioner and moved the belt one tooth over on the cam pulleys and it was obvious my initial belt positions were correct. So now what?!
Why was there some looseness between the pulleys? Is that normal? The belt deflects maybe 1/4" of an inch or slightly more. There was no deflection on the "tight" sections going down to the crank and tensioner unless you pushed it very hard.
Is the Aisin belt out of spec?
What would you do next?
As luck would have it, my only vice is just barely too small to fit the tensioner in to press it back in and insert the "grenade pin", which I would have to source a replacement pin because I tossed it in the bin like a total idiot thinking I'd never need it again.
I will add that I "think" I heard the "bad" tensioner noise on start up one time after installing the new tensioner. Wasn't the first start up. Maybe like tenth. Haven't heard it a second time
And I will also add that I did remove the plugs to make the engine rotate by hand easier and before I pulled the new tensioner to reposition the belt, after a couple manual turns of the engine, the looseness of the section of belt between the pulleys seemed to go away.
Should I just bite the bullet and buy a new belt and tensioner from the dealer? Some people claim the Aisin kits are hit or miss on quality these days.
Lastly, when the parts store guy was reading my trouble code, he tried to clear it while saying if I had unplugged the ECM, which I had to do during the belt replacement, the dealer needed to reset it because it would give me the trouble code I was seeing, implying there wasn't really an issue after all. I had never heard of this and didn't give it any serious consideration. Was I wrong? I'm at the point now where I wish I would've spent the $1200 and had the dealer fix it! Grrrrr!!!t

 

[I<3oil]

Buying the kit was a bad idea since it's not an official piece of OE parts. Should have bought them separately from known dealers with known parts instead of potentially getting counterfeit or lesser quality.

 

[hrv]

2014 Acura RDX with 100k started making common bad hydraulic tensioner noise at start up. Bought the Aisin timing belt kit from Amazon (belt, roller pulleys, tensioner, water pump). Installed it. Only issue I had was rear cam pulley did spring forward 1/4 of a turn, which isn't uncommon. I rotated it back that 1/4 turn to its proper position. Turned engine by hand several times and all timing marks lined up. Drove it. No issues. After a day or so I got emissions warning message. Took it to parts store and their code reader showed ECU fault/timing off. Great! Pulled two upper timing belt/ cam pulley covers off. Marks still lined up. I did notice the tension on the belt on both "outer sides" of the pulleys (the side of the rear pulley closet to firewall and the side of the front pulley closet to radiator) were tight going down to the crank and tensioner, but the section of belt between the two cam pulleys had some looseness that I wouldn't expect, although I'm no authority on how tight the belt should be in that section. I pulled the harmonic balancer and lower timing cover off and timing marks on the crank and two upper pulleys were still in their proper positions. Thinking maybe I was one tooth off, I removed the tensioner and moved the belt one tooth over on the cam pulleys and it was obvious my initial belt positions were correct. So now what?!
Why was there some looseness between the pulleys? Is that normal? The belt deflects maybe 1/4" of an inch or slightly more. There was no deflection on the "tight" sections going down to the crank and tensioner unless you pushed it very hard.
Is the Aisin belt out of spec?
What would you do next?
As luck would have it, my only vice is just barely too small to fit the tensioner in to press it back in and insert the "grenade pin", which I would have to source a replacement pin because I tossed it in the bin like a total idiot thinking I'd never need it again.
I will add that I "think" I heard the "bad" tensioner noise on start up one time after installing the new tensioner. Wasn't the first start up. Maybe like tenth. Haven't heard it a second time
And I will also add that I did remove the plugs to make the engine rotate by hand easier and before I pulled the new tensioner to reposition the belt, after a couple manual turns of the engine, the looseness of the section of belt between the pulleys seemed to go away.
Should I just bite the bullet and buy a new belt and tensioner from the dealer? Some people claim the Aisin kits are hit or miss on quality these days.
Lastly, when the parts store guy was reading my trouble code, he tried to clear it while saying if I had unplugged the ECM, which I had to do during the belt replacement, the dealer needed to reset it because it would give me the trouble code I was seeing, implying there wasn't really an issue after all. I had never heard of this and didn't give it any serious consideration. Was I wrong? I'm at the point now where I wish I would've spent the $1200 and had the dealer fix it! Grrrrr!!!t

Something as important as this I would have got ALL OEM Honda parts...IMO...Using a line from a old Fram commercial.....You can pay me now or pay me later....

 

[John105]

Had Aisin in my LS430 for 6 years now, Aisin is generally regarded as high quality.

 

[jimbanville]

Something as important as this I would have got ALL OEM Honda parts...IMO...Using a line from a old Fram commercial.....You can pay me now or pay me later....

Went off advice on the Honda forums while doing research on the job. Most of the folks there praise the Aisin kits. A handful have had issues.

 

[jimbanville]

[QUOTE="I Buying the kit was a bad idea since it's not an official piece of OE parts. Should have bought them separately from known dealers with known parts instead of potentially getting counterfeit or lesser quality.
[/QUOTE]
Went off advice on the Honda forums while doing research on the job. Most of the folks there praise the Aisin kits. A handful have had issues.

 

[John105]

Went off advice on the Honda forums while doing research on the job. Most of the folks there praise the Aisin kits. A handful have had issues.

If I'm not mistaken some components can be OEM--Japanese mfgs obscure this fact, whereas European is transparent. Example, some kits have Mitsoboshi belts, Koyo idlers, just like OE...

 

[jimbanville]

Had Aisin in my LS430 for 6 years now, Aisin is generally regarded as high quality.

Right. That's why I bought it. Some people claim that only the Aisin kits through rockauto are guaranteed genuine. Nothing about by the kit I got from Amazon was "off". Everything was new/unused and looked legit.

Everyone "recommends" changing all the parts (water pump, roller pulleys, etc) when needing to replace the common "bad" tensioner. Now I wish I had just replaced the tensioner with one from the dealer and left everything else alone. The belt had no visible wear whatsoever, not that a perfectly fine looking belt couldn't snap at some point simply due to age. That's just how frustrated I am right now.

 

[Barkleymut]

you could have gotten the dealer to do that job for $1200? Seems low to me.

Anyways, let it ride for a while if everything is running ok.

 

[jimbanville]

you could have gotten the dealer to do that job for $1200? Seems low to me.

Anyways, let it ride for a while if everything is running ok.

$1200 is common from what I've read for this engine. The kit that I used and that gets a ton of praise was $200.

It's not running right now because I would likely still have the trouble code if it were, and I'm deciding what to do as far as compressing and reinstalling the tensioner.
That's why I posted my question. Looking for expert advice on how to proceed. If I compress and reuse tensioner and I get code again, then what? Replace tensioner with part from dealer and see what happens? Then replace belt with part from dealer? Replace both at same time? Other possibilities? Why was there slack in the middle section of belt between pulleys that went away after I pulled plugs and hand spun motor?

 

[The Critic]

For a replacement pin, use a drill bit.

My first thought is that you did not remove all of the slack between the two cam pullies, but that usually results in the cam (or the crank) jumping a tooth - which you confirmed was not the case.

The only other possibilities are: 1) timing belt is out of spec in some way, 2) need to perform the CKP relearn

Personally I'm a little weary of Aisin kits after my bad experience last year - a Pilot jumped several teeth after 10k+ miles for no apparent reason.

 

[John105]

$1200 is common from what I've read for this engine. The kit that I used and that gets a ton of praise was $200.

It's not running right now because I would likely still have the trouble code if it were, and I'm deciding what to do as far as compressing and reinstalling the tensioner.
That's why I posted my question. Looking for expert advice on how to proceed. If I compress and reuse tensioner and I get code again, then what? Replace tensioner with part from dealer and see what happens? Then replace belt with part from dealer? Replace both at same time? Other possibilities? Why was there slack in the middle section of belt between pulleys that went away after I pulled plugs and hand spun motor?

in 2017 Lexus wanted $1,800, and a Japanese indie wanted $950, using the Aisin kit. I decided to let them mark it up because now it was 1/12000 warranty. If I saved $150 in buying online, and provided the parts, no warranty. Nothing happened, been fine for 6 years and about 55k. This same indie does Honda, so maybe the proportion is same v. dealer, dunno....(and in 2023 labor has skyrocketed it was $145 last fall, $90 back in 2017)

 

[jimbanville]

For a replacement pin, use a drill bit.

My first thought is that you did not remove all of the slack between the two cam pullies, but that usually results in the cam (or the crank) jumping a tooth - which you confirmed was not the case.

The only other possibilities are: 1) timing belt is out of spec in some way, 2) need to perform the CKP relearn

Personally I'm a little weary of Aisin kits after my bad experience last year - a Pilot jumped several teeth after 10k+ miles for no apparent reason.

Ok. First I'm hearing of ckp relearn. Haven't run across that in any of the videos or discussions on the "how to's" of doing this job. Was that what the parts guy was referring to? We drive the car several hundred miles with the trouble code. It went away once but did come back.

 

[jimbanville]

in 2017 Lexus wanted $1,800, and a Japanese indie wanted $950, using the Aisin kit. I decided to let them mark it up because now it was 1/12000 warranty. If I saved $150 in buying online, and provided the parts, no warranty. Nothing happened, been fine for 6 years and about 55k. This same indie does Honda, so maybe the proportion is same v. dealer, dunno....(and in 2023 labor has skyrocketed it was $145 last fall, $90 back in 2017)

$1200 is what dealer quoted and matched some figures I saw online. Did the Lexus use a belt? My v6 camry uses a chain.

 

[The Critic]

Ok. First I'm hearing of ckp relearn. Haven't run across that in any of the videos or discussions on the "how to's" of doing this job. Was that what the parts guy was referring to?

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2020/MC-10180017-0001.pdf

Very last item. If you review the factory service instructions for timing belt replacement, it always states to perform the CKP relearn. It is rarely needed and almost never gets done, but it is worth a shot. If all 3 marks truly line-up as you describe, it should not be giving you any faults. Were you able to retrieve the exact fault codes that are being generated?

 

[Hall]

you could have gotten the dealer to do that job for $1200? Seems low to me.

Going rate around here is closer to $1400 so not way out of line

 

[jimbanville]

https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2020/MC-10180017-0001.pdf

Very last item. If you review the factory service instructions for timing belt replacement, it always states to perform the CKP relearn. It is rarely needed and almost never gets done, but it is worth a shot. If all 3 marks truly line-up as you describe, it should not be giving you any faults. Were you able to retrieve the exact fault codes that are being generated?

Thanks. I should have taken a photo of the read out. Oh well.
All the marks line up. The rear pulley is hard to see the way the motor sits in the car, but when I moved the belt one tooth, it was obvious my initial positioning was correct.

 

[The Critic]

I'd say if the CKP relearn doesn't work, just get a belt, tensioner and w/p from the dealer and redo.

At least you won't get to hear the nasty warbling sound from the Aisin kits.

 

[jimbanville]

I'd say if the CKP relearn doesn't work, just get a belt, tensioner and w/p from the dealer and redo.

At least you won't get to hear the nasty warbling sound from the Aisin kits.

Thanks. I'll be leaving the kit's w/p in place. Seems to be okay and temp is spot on. Same goes for the new roller pulleys I installed. Rather than seek out someone/someplace that will compress the tensioner for me (which some say you should do slowly), I'm tempted to throw money at it and just buy the one from the dealer.

 

[I<3oil]

you could have gotten the dealer to do that job for $1200? Seems low to me.

Anyways, let it ride for a while if everything is running ok.

$1200 is about right for a dealer. Indy shops are around like $800-1200, dealers $1,200-2,000.