I have a 2002 Stratus. I just replaced the cylinder head and by extension the timing belt. If Dodge's goal was to make this job a total fiasco - mission accomplished. I was once an auto mechanic professionally, but that was a long time ago and cars have changed dramatically since then. I still do my own work because I do not want to pay the outrageous charges shops want. After doing this job and replacing a rear ball joint on the same car last year, I see why shops want to charge so much. Trouble is, the mechanic doesn't get all the money. I nearly destroyed an OTC ball joint press trying to press the ball joint back in. Prior to this job, I used to think Volkswagens were absolutely the worst cars to work on. The Dodge Stratus make them like working on bicyles. I have replaced many many timing belts - this was by far the worst I've ever encountered.

Anyway, I put it together, manually turning the engine twice to make sure. I thought I had the timing marks correctly aligned so I fired it up. It ran horribly. I read a few on-line comments and after checking, found that I had no vacuum leaks - at least none I could find - and that everything else was in order. So I disassembled the whole right side of the engine again and found that I was a tooth off. So I realigned everything and this time even used a straight-edge to align the cam marks. As is the case with this engine three of them were spot-on; the fourth drops below the line. This time I was dead on the money - reassembled everthing. Still runs like garbage.

I had to do this over several weeks; I don't have a garage and the local parts stores were outrageous with their prices so I had to deal with weather and waiting. I read somewhere that people had problems with their vehicle's computer after being disconnected from the battery for several weeks and that the computer had to basically "learn" how to run the car again - much like putting a GM prom chip in a new computer. My car has run off and on for at least an hour or two while I checked things over and watched the cooling system and topped it off, but things aren't getting any better.

Just for curiousity's sake I connected an old timing light to watch the cam sprockets to see if the marks were lining up. Well, they do - when they aren't "dancing" back and forth with each other; they would move within a range of about zero to half an inch apart. I attributed that to perhaps the electronics were not quite hitting it at the exact same moment each time. Then I tried the other plug wires just to see if they would light the light. 1 and 3 seem to only be firing intermittently; 2 and 4 seem to be hitting every time. I even used the light on my wife's car to test the light against her car. It lit up perfectly everytime, so I don't think there's a problem with the timing light Coil pack? Maybe, but how can a coil pack that was working perfectly go bad just sitting in the trunk for a month? I am going to limp up to the local parts store and have the codes pulled.

I know I have spoken in very general terms and there is not much "red-meat" here, but I think I have given anyone who reads this the gist of what is happening. Maybe someone else has had a similar experience. I have also learned that this timing belt issue is not unusual - quite the contrary. More than once I saw the 2.4L timing belt characterized as the "dreaded" 2.4L timing belt.

Thank you,

trqwrench

trqwrench2@hotmail.com