850 140k Major Maintenance

[javajay72]

Wow!!!If only you made this a couple of months earlier.I did this job Ozark but never really had success.I can tell you that i can replace the timing belt pretty damn fast now though.I either had a problem I wasn't aware of prior or I bent a valve starting it up when things were not right.....I'm not to sure....I fell in love with working on my Volvo and like most relationships I'm trying to figure out if I did something screwed up or if it was already there.....Regardless i have fluid on passenger side floor(sort of oily)and on the driver's floor it looks like antifreeze......What does this sound like?Car sounds like it's missing and it almost has the same noise of a car that's down 3 quarts of oil.I was thinking head gasket but there is no white smoke coming from the exhaust and no oil in the antifreeze(I emptied the coolant from the radiator)....Looking at the oil i can't really tell.I probably need to do a compression check but that's something I haven't done ever or seen it done.I'm getting that 95 turbo wagon soon so all in all this has been a good learning experience.Let me know what you think when you get a chance......

Thanks
Jay

[C@lvin]

"anitfreeze on the floor" - you have a leak either in the pipes feeding coolant through the firewall above the driver's side floor board to the heater core or in the heater core itself located behind the lower console in the middle. (locations for left hand drive cars - don't know if it's different sides for right hand drive)

If you take the kick plate cover off and pull the carpet down from the console next to the gas pedal, you should be able to see where your leak is coming from. Coolant can leak onto both sides

This is a doable DIY fix for most anyone in my opinion.

[insndrvr]

I did this job this weekend and it went pretty smoothly. The directions were really good. The one thing I stumbled on that made the job a little easier was my lower passenger engine mount. When I went to get the old timing belt out, I could see that there was zero room to get the belt between the crank pulley and the mount. The car had been leaking oil and everything was so covered in sand and oil that you would barely make out the mount, let alone that it was sitting at the bottom of it's travel.

So I removed the mount and rested the engine on a socket to finish the rest of the work. The engine happened to be sitting a little bit higher and low and behold, the tools fit in the work area a lot better. I was able to get my 3/8" ratchet with T45 torx onto the tensioner bolt as well as getting to some of the other bolts easier as well. Taking the two bolts out that attach this mount to the engine is really easy once you have the wheel and fender liner out, and it makes all the other parts that much easier.

I recommend disconnecting the mount and lifting the engine a little with a jack to give yourself a little more working room. With the mount out completely, you can also play with the height of the engine for the really hard to reach stuff. It even helped me get my oil filter wrench on the filter by lowering the engine.

[chax]

When changing the TB, consider doing this: after you've lined up the timing marks at TDC, use a magic marker to mark the TB, making corresponding marks on the cam and crank sprockets. Then, by counting the teeth between the marks on the old TB, mark the new belt identically. Put it back on so that the marks on the new TB line up with the marks on the cam and crank sprockets. It’s fool-proof.

NOTE: I haven't done a TB change on my 850, but it appears that in order to do the above, it would probably be necessary to remove the pulley "in front of" the crankshaft TB cog.

[MeganGx3]

I performed this maintenance this past Saturday and Lee your instructions were spot on!
I replaced all the components you mentioned and for me, a first time n00b, it took about 6 hours of time – taking my time.

A couple of minor notes for first time DIYers:
1) Remove the radiator fill tank from its bracket to give yourself some more room. I disconnected the electrical connection and disconnected from the tank the tube that connects to the top of the thermostat then just set the tank on the back of the engine.

2) Though you didn't mention it it looks like you removed the serpentine belt tensioner. With these auto parts I did this as well and it opens up a good deal of room. Two 12mm bolts as binglax09 mentions.

I didn't have a serp belt tool and ended up using a small pry bar. It was a bit smaller than the opening but grabbed and turned the pulley just fine. Stanley model 55-045 if anyone is interested.

I had read many many threads about this maintenance so I was fairly comfortable doing it. Lee your instructions for starting the belt and maintaining tension from the drive shaft to the intake pulley was great. I had no problems following it or with the timing.

As ridiculous as it may be the thing that gave me the most difficulty is the petcock on the radiator. It's my Achilles heel. Take Lee's advice, remove the radiator hose.

Thanks! I am a first time DIYer this was awesome. Saved me a LOT of time researching

[cronce66]

I just undertook this maintenance and I'm running into a frustrating issue. After I get the belt in place, There's not enough room or slack in the belt left to get the tensioner in place. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but it seems like the belt is almost too short. Any ideas on what I need to be doing? When looking at Lee's post, his pictures after getting the timing belt and tensioner back on show a little slack still. Also, it seems like others doing this aren't having a problem. I need help.

[cronce66]

Additionally, I have one of the cam locking tools from IPD, but it doesn't seem to fit right, either. Any suggestions for this, too?

[Ozark Lee]

There should be no slack whatsoever from the crankshaft sprocket, across the idler and onto the intake cam sprocket. The cam locker might actually be hurting you. I don't use the locker tool so I have no hands on knowledge about it.

I have to "massage" the belt onto the intake cam sprocket and the sprocket itself may actually come back a millimeter or so to get the belt seated since the old belt stretched a bit.

The picture with the slack belt was the rough routing around the various pulleys and sprockets. It should be tight like a guitar string on the intake side when it is correctly routed.

...Lee

[cronce66]

Thanks for the response. So, should it really be that hard to install a new tensioner? I fought with it for quite a while, and didn't win. When I'm pulling up on the tensioner pulley to try and get the tensioner in, I still don't have enough room no matter what. Is that improper routing of the belt then? I started from the bottom of the crankshaft pulley, then to the inside of the idler pulley, then around the intake cam sprocket, then over to the exhaust sprocket, and lastly around the water pump sprocket and tensioner pulley. With the belt on, I can push down the belt about 1/4 to 1/2 an inch between cam sprockets. Is that too loose? How do you keep it from sliding on the crankshaft sprocket when trying to make it tight? How many teeth of the belt should be between the top of each cam sprocket?

[Ozark Lee]

The tensioner should slide right in when you lift the pulley. Are you re-using the old tensioner and, if so, did you re-compress it and lock it? If you are using a new tensioner you can't put the plastic spacer on until the last step, after you pull the grenade pin.

It can be a bear to get on due to the limited amount of space and I have used the old plastic spacer since it was more compliant on a couple of my cars. My hand strength is limited since I used to be a springboard diver and a few mistakes meant a lot of broken bones in my hands after they smacked the diving board.

...Lee