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[Alan Cordeiro <alan.cordeiro@mts.com>]

5K owners,

Last weekend I completed the timing belt R&R, thought I would
share some thoughts while they were fresh, so here goes...

I used the last writeup by Steve Jagernauth, dated 8/16/95 found
in the archives as a starting point and tried looking for more
from the group.

Stott Hare was very helpful, and express mailed me the (in)famous
tool, which was very helpful, that crankshaft bolt was on VERY
tight. I literally ended up jacking up one end of an 18 inch breaker
bar, and then jumped down on the front of the car to free it loose.
(Thanks again Stott).

the belts took a while to get off, Steve's idea of loosening the PS belt
and just letting it come off with the Harmonic Balencer worked great.
Oh yes, I pulled the bumper and IC before all this.

Taking the front covers off exposed the belt, which came off quickly.
I then discovered that I needed to take off the rear cover to get to the
water pump.

after removing  all the small screws that held rear cover I found
that the top is also held by the upper canshaft pulley. NO WAY
to get the waterpump off without either removing the rear cover
or seriously deforming it. 

Not willing to take a chance on being able to reshape the cover
especially within fractions of inches of a brand new belt travelling
at high speeds, I proceeded to struggle with the pulley, which
was tightened with similar force to the crankshaft bolt.....

With the camshaft pulley, cover, water pump, idler pulley
off, ( oh yes, the idler pulley needs a bolt luckily found
in by "spare" nuts and bolts tray, and a puller arrangement
to force it off.

i cleaned up the front surface of the engine where the new
pump and O-ring were to make contact, and the rest of
the front for good measure too. Then proceeded to pull out
and replace the front crankshaft oil seal. No major problems,
except the previous seal was somewhat mangled.

I put back the waterpump, the rear cover, camshaft pulley,
and the crankshaft pulley WITH the belt.  Got all timing
marks aligned, and went to tension the waterpump.

After getting suitable tension on the waterpump, I wanted
to tighten up on the PIVOT bolt as the final step. Thats when
I discovered that it was BELOW THE REAR COVER !!!

I tried to remove the bolt without deforming the rear cover, but
was unsuccessful. For reasons above, I decided against 
deforming the cover, and proceeded to remove the crankshaft
pulley, belt, camshaft pulley, the idler pulley, and cover, then
removed the stupid bolt, and reinstalled ( reverse of removal..)
all these items. retensioned the belt, tightened all bolts....

The rest is mostly drudge work, except for the really dumb
kluge that goes below the fan belt system ( no fan..) between
the alternator and airconditioner. The item I'm referring to is
that tensioner bar, with right/left hand threads like a 
turnbuckle in reverse, the kind of thing on tie rod ends. Since
that thing attaches to the alternator slide bracket, an incorrect
position of the alternator slide bracket will not allow the alternator
to move down to correctly tension the alternator belt.

After all this, I quit for the evening ( yeah, more like night...)

Next day, reattach intercooler, after adding a few more loops
of "reinforced nylon strapping tape" in a section that looked
like it had lost some strength over the last two/three years,
to ensure that the IC would not "pop" again. Started car, idled
beautifully.

Warmed up car a bit, did a few quick rev-ups. and shut down.
removed on of the front boltsd on the outer belt cover, and checked
on how well the belt was staying right in the center of the camshaft
pulley. Seemed right in the center..... great.

Installed fron bumper, took car for short drive,,,, sucess.....

Alan
1986 5kQ 165,000 miles, third belt.

P.S. now for the worst part. I got in the car Monday morning,
to get to a customer's site by 8:00. Made it half a mile down
the road, and DIED. 

Inspection/debugging late Monday evening indicated a new
fuel pump ( in-tank ) is called for as a suitable sacrafice to
the Audi Gods.

The last month has seen new rear rotors and calipers, new 
timing belt, WPump, idler, new PS and AC belts, and
continues to supply my significant other with all the 
ammunition she needs to convince me that its time
I came to my senses and faced reality ( and got rid
of the problem )

I'm in Atlanta all next week. The Audi will sit right there
in the middle of the garage ( pump on its way, perhaps
Wednesday ) all next week reminding her, as she continues
to park her van outside in the cold.

WOW, that was quite a letter,,,  sorry for the bandwidth,
a lot to get off my chest....Thanks all.