1990 Camry 3S-FE 5 speed with 167,000 miles
Thanks to all the excellent writeups on this site, I felt confident to take on the big job of replacing the timing belt and trying to stop up some of the fluid leaks. This car has been in the family for about 10 years, and we had no record of the Timing Belt ever being replaced.
The car was leaking coolant big time, about 1 quart every week (and that was with light driving). 'Course there was the usual assortment of oil leaks from all the usual suspects.
Here are the parts that were replaced:
1. Water pump
2. Timing Belt
3. TB idler and tensioner
4. Cam seal (twice, explained below)
5. Crank Seal
6. Oil pump shaft seal and 'batwing/spaghetti' o-ring
7. Oil pump rotor set (more on this later....)
8. Distributor shaft o-ring
9. Valve cover gasket
10. Water pump housing o-ring (mating surface to block)
11. Thermostat bypass pipe o-ring
12. Radiator hose (upper)
13. Power steering belt
14. Rotor / cap / plug wires
15. Plugs
I won't try to duplicate here all the excellent information that others have posted on this job, but I thought I'd add some insights that I gained.
1. Getting the cam seal installed is not easy. On my first attempt, I greased the seal well, then used the cam gear and bolt to 'press' the seal into place (using the old seal stacked on top of the new seal). This was not a great method - I could see that the seal wasn't seated well, there was some rubber from the outside of the seal that started to bubble and bunch up. This seal failed to hold oil. After just a few miles of driving, the seal was obviously leaking, so I pulled it all apart and tried a second time. This time I went to Lowes to find some kind of plumbing fitting that would fit the seal and the cam journal. Here is what I found and
it worked perfectly. This is a PVC pipe fitting that is 1.5" slip joint by 1/2" threaded pipe. The outside diameter is just barely smaller than the seal, and the inside diameter fits over the cam journal. The small 1/2" hole is perfect for a bolt and washer. You'll need a longer bolt than the cam gear bolt.
2. After removing the outer half of the oil pump (to replace the shaft seal), I could see the shaft had some serious wear from the OEM seal lip. I was afraid that even a new seal would still leak. There was a groove worn in the shaft. Turns out you can order a 'rotor set' from the dealer ( cost: $43.27 part#: 15102-63010 ). No need to replace the entire oil pump. Here's how my original one looked.
3. While not directly related to the TB job, I also cleaned the throttlebody and the EGR valve. The EGR 'port' into the air intake plenum was completely (100%) blocked with carbon! I used Seaform Deep Creep cleaner on everything.
4. Happily, my crankshaft harmonic balancer did not require a puller - I was able to slide it off by hand (with some very gentle nudging with a large slotted screwdriver). I had been working on the bolt quite awhile with my whimpy air impact gun so maybe that loosened it up. The only way I could break the crankshaft bolt loose was to use the 'starter' trick. I had a breaker bar attached to the crankshaft bolt and the bar lined up perfectly with the hole in the front bracket that is used to tie down the car when transported. I was able to fit a large bolt through the hole in the breaker bar handle and it fit into the hole in the tie-down bracket. One blip of the starter (remove the plug wires!) and the bolt was free.
5. I suggest that you avoid the temptation to only remove and replace the water pump. Instead, go ahead and remove the WP housing so you can replace the o-ring that seals the housing to the block. Also, you can replace the o-ring around the thermostat bypass pipe. Both these o-rings were include in the water pump that I bought from Autozone. Also the gasket for the other bypass pipe (where it attaches to the thermostat with 2 nuts) was included in the WP. There was also an extra screw included, I suspect this was for when the same pump is used on the 5S-FE engine (Gen 3 Camrys). Use emery cloth to polish the cast iron block area for the o-ring to seal well and also use a little smear of Blue RTV sealant. Be sure to carefully scrap the old gasket from the water pump - be careful, it's aluminum. A
light application of my wire wheel (on the grinder) cleaned it up real nice. After the bolts are removed from the WP housing/thermostat housing and it seems like it should come off (it kinda flops around), then you must carefully pry the housing off the bypass pipe (where the o-ring is located). This required (for me) a surprising amount of effort - it was really stuck on there. I used Blue RTV sealant on all the sealing surfaces (including where there were gaskets).
6. The crank seal was easy to install. It went in by hand most of the way, then I used a (un-sharpened) carpenter's pencil (the flat kind) and tapped it in all the way.
7. The first time I had the engine back together and started it, there was an obvious rubbing sound on the lower TB cover. After a few miles of test driving, I decided to remove the harmonic balancer and try to diagnose the problem. That was when I noticed the oil from the bad cam seal job. I replaced the cam seal a second time (got a new one) with the PVC fitting. Then I went back to figuring out the TB cover rubbing noise. I could see that it was both the PS belt and the harmonic balancer that was rubbing (from the scratches in the plastic cover). I carefully put it all back together and the rubbing noise stopped. I'm pretty sure the problem was this: all the 10mm bolts that hold the TB cover have metal sleeves that keep the bolt from crushing the plastic cover. BUT, 3 of the sleeves are designed to fit inside holes in the oil pump (thereby aligning the TB cover accurately for the timing marks). I think I must have not 'seated' a sleeve in the hole, rather it was sitting on top (outside the hole) when the bolt was tightened. Anyway, something to watch for.
This is merely a simple gesture to 'give back' for all the great help I get from you all. Thanks
Oh.... yeah, all the leaks are gone and the engine runs well.
Doug
Timing Belt, Water Pump, etc. - What I learned
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