So...car had the 40k service last week, the most expensive one. The cambelt being the big item of course. However, at just 4 years old and with just 31k on the clock, the cambelt was showing serious signs of early wear. I would not have been happy for it to go another year particularly as it's a PD engine it drives. I don't have photo's as I didn't do the work. I rarely touch my own cars these days. But I'm saw the belt and it was starting to crack and wasn't looking too good. In my experience, when you can see cracking, the inner fibres and layers are already starting to loosen and give, leading to the cracking. Belts tend to wear from the inside out according to the boffins. I agree. Our car does get driven very hard, by me anyway. That is when I'm not in economy mode. Wonder if my driving style helped the belt to wear more quickly. The technician said he examined everything very closely to make sure all was well and it was. As a precaution the tensioner was replaced early, just in case but the water pump on this occasion was not. It was smooth and weep free and should remain so until next time.

Of course all the filters were changed, and loads of other stuff done. The fuel system had a good cleaner added to it by the workshop too. In all, my Skoda dealer did a superb job. Surprisingly, the car is now much much more powerful with extra oodles of torque. It wasn't at all lacking before either. But best of all, it's clocking up an extra 3-4mpg all the time in almost every type of driving. Diesels are not noted for losing power between services, but considering just how little is required to be done on the 1422cc PD TDI in the preceeding years, I suppose it's inevitable a big difference might be made by the 4 year service.

Anyhoo, I'm pleased.

It does amaze me how they can gauge a belt by miles - 40k of town use (low gears and idling a lot) is a lot more engine revolutions than 40k on a motorway in top gear. One can only assume they go by the worst case but (devils advocate) if your car spent 10,000 hours idling, the "clock" would say you don't need a new belt...

That's a plus one on that phil. Yes, the worst case scenario is usually the one they work on...but it did surprise me a little that the belt was wearing so readily. It's not uncommon though and no doubt why Skoda/VW decided to lower the miles and time limit to make sure no one suffered an engine fatality. The Skoda tech was good though. He did what I used to do and had a good look round to see if there were any underlying causes for the wear. But everything was ok, nothing fundamentally wrong or out of alignment. Mrs Estate woman said I must stop driving it like I ride my motorcycles ie: on the edge all the time! I just love that surge of torque though and it revs so freely!

Hehe. Yes these PD engines have a lovely and addictive torque surge as the turbo spools up.

Good job you got it done then.

I remember my other half had a Pug 306 1.9D and when I aksed if it had ever had the belt done I was met by a blank expression. It was about 2 years and 10k miles overdue. The guy who did it (a local pug specialist) said it's a good job we did it when we did. It was in a bit of a state. He showed it to me and it was very cracked all over and the tensioner, he said, had gone very loose!

Wonder how many people out there ignore the belt change interval and end up with a broken engine? I know my neighbours did with their old Astra 1.6.

Phil

Maybe it's age not miles that's causing the cracking ect...

Cambelt changes on my last car (fiat grande punto 1.9 diesel) were 90,000 miles, and services 18,000 miles... When I changed the cambelt on that at 90k, on inspection it was 'as new' ... Perfectly serviceable, I changed it anyway of course..

BUT my car was only 2 years old at that time

Degradation is a mixture of the two - use and age.

sharkrider - at a guess, to get those sort of miles, then that's a lot of motorway use, so less engine revolutions per mile. Hence highly likely it would have looked like a belt half its age..

Nope, driving school car

Nope, driving school car, interestingly it was also 4 years though, if you didn't make 90k !

I quiried it though, (early on) because the same engine in the alfas had suffered incidents of broken cambelts, but the fiats hadn't, the tech said, although the engines were the same, fiat used better quality belts, and said it would do 90k, without issues... (sorry if double post, on my phone..)

All belts will crack, doesn't mean they are about to snap. It is just the outer coating that has stressed and flexed. I bet if you looked after 6 months and 10k it would look the same.

So...car had the 40k service last week, the most expensive one. The cambelt being the big item of course. However, at just 4 years old and with just 31k on the clock, the cambelt was showing serious signs of early wear. I would not have been happy for it to go another year particularly as it's a PD engine it drives. I don't have photo's as I didn't do the work. I rarely touch my own cars these days. But I'm saw the belt and it was starting to crack and wasn't looking too good. In my experience, when you can see cracking, the inner fibres and layers are already starting to loosen and give, leading to the cracking. Belts tend to wear from the inside out according to the boffins. I agree. Our car does get driven very hard, by me anyway. That is when I'm not in economy mode. Wonder if my driving style helped the belt to wear more quickly. The technician said he examined everything very closely to make sure all was well and it was. As a precaution the tensioner was replaced early, just in case but the water pump on this occasion was not. It was smooth and weep free and should remain so until next time.

Of course all the filters were changed, and loads of other stuff done. The fuel system had a good cleaner added to it by the workshop too. In all, my Skoda dealer did a superb job. Surprisingly, the car is now much much more powerful with extra oodles of torque. It wasn't at all lacking before either. But best of all, it's clocking up an extra 3-4mpg all the time in almost every type of driving. Diesels are not noted for losing power between services, but considering just how little is required to be done on the 1422cc PD TDI in the preceeding years, I suppose it's inevitable a big difference might be made by the 4 year service.

Anyhoo, I'm pleased.

Estate Man - Do you know what the 5 year service consists of?

Is it regarded as 5 year/50,000 service?

Dibujo, not sure as I haven't even checked the service manual. But it isn't very much that needs to be done. The 4 year service is the big one and the most expensive on these engines.