My final patient
2017 Optima, 2.4 Theta II, 103K (yes it heavily burns oil)
While having the hood up for it's weekly top off, I noticed the serpentine belt was coming apart
This belt uses a normal spring tensioner and drives the A/C and alternator
The inner stretch belt drives the water pump alone
I've never changed a stretch belt before, and wow do I never want to do it again
The catalog was unclear, so it turned out both the Rib Ace belts were what I needed
The serpentine popped off with a leveraged 17mm, and I cut the WP belt off
I'm not used to serpentine belts failing like this at the 100k mark
Both were the factory originals
I then proceeded to spend the next 1.5 hours being profound with my profanity
trying to get that stretch belt on
I did it, from up top, without removing the wheel
No, I'm not ever doing it again
All done, nice and quiet
Gotta clean the belt debris from everywhere
Now, onto keys
He only had one for this car, so I used it as a guinea pig for the Autel iKeys that came with my KM100
It worked, but I'm a stickler for detail, so $30 was allocated for an OEM style smart key
The goal was to make a complete second key (emergency key) included
I think it turned out pretty well, missing the Kia logo of course but who really cares
Finding someone locally to cut laser keys was a chore, especially someone that would cut something I supply, and for a fair price
I wound up at a rather unexpected place, Ace Hardware
Walked in, store manager was the only one that could work the rebranded Xhorse machine
They didn't flinch at my simple ask, unlike the other half dozen places I called/stopped into
At 11am on a Sunday no less
It's like a little baby Bridgeport
$5.44 later, I was out the door with my laser key copied
And it actually worked, which is better than I can say for some locksmiths I've paid good money to
Programmed the iKey out, reprogrammed the other two keys, topped off the perpetually oil burning Theta II and sent him down the road
