Who would've guessed you'd have to take apart the whole thing to get to the timing belt?! Oh well, while this is an exaggeration I do have a problem.
After taking all of the pieces of the old belt out and reinstalling the new one I realized I needed a new hyd. tensioner. The old one wouldn't compress. I replaced it but even when I push it all the way up I still can't get it to put significant pressure on the pulley. As a result, the belt is loose and I can't get it to tighten. My friend suggested that maybe the parts store sold me the wrong belt. I checked with all of the parts stores in town and they are the same. The Goodyear belt was even longer than the NAPA belt I bought. Maybe there was an update to the mechanics I don't know about? Perhaps all of the parts stores in town are on drugs?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

maybe you have an aftermarkey set of gears take your old belt with u and get one or cheack it with ur new to see length. aftermarket underdrive pulleys played that trick on me had to match them up ..bought the car like that though so i didnt know well hope this mayyy help may not though well happy motoring

 

o yeah while ur that far into it may as well change ur water pump or ull have to do it all again to change it and timeing belts are good for lik 100000 miles so

 

Aftermarket gears are the same size as stock, so even if you did have them it won't affect that. As the hyd. tens. goes throw it in a table vise and that will push the little piece in. It won't break it, I've done it at least 5 times to mine. Once it's compressed there is a small hole in the hyd. piston itself that you can put an allen wrench into. Make sure the wrench is a tight fit cuz you don't want the piston to move much. then bolt the hyd. ten in placebut leave the bolts loose so you can slide it up into place. You then need a torque wrench to tighten the belt to I think it's 30 ft/lbs presser. you need to hold the T. wrench at 30 and move the hyd. tens up tight and then tighten the bolts down. once the bolts are tight you take out the T. wrench and then pull the allen wrench in the hyd tens. pistion. But you really need to get the exact ft. lbs. presser for what the timing belt needs. I haven't changed a timing belt in a while so I'm on a guess.

 

yea i bet a set of underdrive cam gears would work real well.....