It appears the tension roller on my 03 neon is going out. I makes a whining noise all the time. It just started as soon as we got it out of the shop. They surfaced the head, replaced the head gasket, timing belt, water pump, and replaced the hoses and serpentine belt.

Irritating. They say the job will cost about $780.00 for that stupid little thing. If they can replace the roller itself, it will cost $350.00.

I kind of miss the old days where you loosened a couple of bolts and stuck a crowbar in there and tightened it all down again...

Now I know what they meant when the told me that Neon's were "disposable cars".

 

The accessory belt pulley? It's like $30 at a parts store and is held on with one bolt. What shop did you take it to? Since I'm near Sac, I want to make sure I avoid that place like the plague.

 

It's just a local shop here in Orangevale. The problem is it seems that the entire assembly is pressed into some sort of plate that is also used to bolt the motor mount to the engine. The spring assembly and roller can't be taken out from the front, and must be removed from that back, which can only be done by taking off the motor mount and unbolting this plate from the engine.

They say you can even change just the roller, but it still requires that the plate be removed to do that also.

 

Well, what part are they talking about exactly? The pulley or the spring-loaded arm/tensioner itself? Either way, yeah, the engine mount bracket/plate has to be removed. That is why I always recommend changing the accessory belt pulley amongst other wear and tear parts when changing your timing belt and water pump. There is 0 extra labor to do it as they are already coming off of the car to get to the timing belt and water pump. If the $350 to replace the pulley includes the labor, then yeah, that makes sense (I read right past the part where you said you already picked up the car. On occasion, I tend to skip to the problem and answer it which leads me to skipping details at times). It is roughly a 2.4 hour job to R&R the engine mount bracket.

 

Well, if you had done it, I'd have that part changed not. They did replace the motor mounts, they could have done it then. I just assumed they would replace that when they added on the replacement of the belt and the hoses. If I was still able to do the work myself, I would have replaced it. I'm just like that.

For example... I've been playing "Real Racing 3" on my Iphone. When the game says a car part needs maintenance, I just fix the things that are close to the red line before they need to be fixed anyway!