I did the timing belt in 2015 car has driven fine for 20k miles since then. Kit used
Car had a bank 1 sensor 2 O2 sensor error and the sensor was replaced, code reset and didn't come back
Car went to Lexus for airbag replacement.
Car started throwing evap system error codes, looked under the hood and some evap hoses had obviously been tampered with, put hoses back on cleared codes drove 500+ miles no codes.

Yesterday my wife drove car approximately 5 miles, starts running "funny" she was at a light, put the car in neutral made a sshhhshhsh noise and died, wouldn't restart. She called me a met her at the light, scanned the car and P0340 is the code. I was standing outside the car and had her crank it over. It started, but it was ticking so I had her shut it down and pushed it off the road at 6:00am. Had it towed to mechanic, $85 for the 3 block tow, $109 for them to scan, their scan came up with an additional code, crank position sensor. On the crank sensor they found lots of timing belt dust. I'm not interested in paying a bunch more labor and the $85 3 block tow is not sitting well with me. I rented a tow dolly and got the car home, took the front covers off this morning and it's obvious that the timing belt jumped.

When turning over the motor I believe can feel the valves touching the pistons, but it could just be compression escaping as turning over slowly. The car never really ran like this, accept maybe 3 seconds, at idle so dose the head need removed and checked?

My plan is to replace the timing belt with the Aisin kit and reset the timing, put the car back together and see if it will run. Should the cam and crank sensor be replaced, or are they going to be fine after the car is back in time? And which one is the cam sensor I am getting a lot of conflicting responses on forums and at parts stores.


Is this plan acceptable?

Thanks,
Ernie

Overview

Crank TDC (just before TDC)

Upper passenger side cam timing on TDC

Upper drivers side cam timing way before TDC

is this the cam position sensor?

 

 

Sorry to hear about the jump.

Your plan makes sense, hopefully the engine wasn't damaged when the belt jumped. Do you think it is a bad tensioner?

Instead of replacing the belt, maybe you should just replace the tensioner and reset the timing. If your engine is bad, you saved yourself $100 bucks and the time it takes to put in a new belt kit.

If the engine is still good, you can spend the money for the new kit and put it in.

We were the discussion board of the month at rock auto a couple of months ago. We get a 5% discount on anything we buy this month. If you buy the aisin kit from rockauto it is actually cheaper than amazon

 

I already ordered a kit from amazon. should have waited until I got the info on Rock Auto discount.
The current belt has some teeth that look ground up so I don't want to use it for anything, all the dust is from it. I'm hoping it was a tensioner. One shop said that the water pump was leaking near the crank sensor. Maybe that caused the tensioner to fail? Plan to get the new belt kit on and see what happens. Maybe a leak down or compression check before starting, I can pull the plugs and run a boroscope down there to see if a piston is damaged, but that is not going to show any valve bent. If the valves are bent, I haven't decided on what to do. I'll research those options soon I guess.

Ernie

 

Dear Ernie,I Know your post is from a few years back buy I have curranty experienced a very similar situation with my SC430. Car lost power out of the blue and after having it OBD scanned it came up with a Knock sensor fault. This sensor was replaced but didn’t fix the problem. So, we had the Timing belt looked at and to our surprise it had jumped by three teeth causing the timing to be out. So, I had a new belt fitted and pulleys and this didn’t fix the problem. Then I OBD scanned the car again as it just stopped running and would not start. A crank sensor code came up. When I went to check the crank sensor, I noticed that the wiring had been cut by the AUX belt and all the wires in the looming had been in contact with each other. So, I fixed each wire, connected the crank sensor up again and fired up the car. Again, it still doesn’t run smooth and there is no power. So, I’ve bought a new secondhand engine for it as I believe that the valves have been damaged, and the engine is misfiring badly.

 

I was just reading this thread and was going to post about your car Juan , but then i see you have already shared your info

 

Thanks for your message.

 

Juan, I'm curious to know the history of your SC regarding its timing belt issue. Such as: Was this the original belt that failed? If so, at what mileage/year did it fail at (i.e. 100K/10)? Or, was this a replacement belt? If so, what brand, and how long did it last and who did the replacement? Or, did you buy your SC used and don't know any history on it? I'm hoping to use this information to help me determine when to replace my timing belt. Thanks, Wilson

 

Hi Wilson,

The belt that slipped was only fitted only two years ago and it was a dayco timing belt kit. My SC failed last week at 95k miles and my car is a 2001 model.

My SC lost power of the blue and before I checked the timing belt I did a OBD scan. So after the scan a Knock sensor fault came up. So, I replaced the sensor (£241) this didn't make any difference I checked the cat converter as I was getting a strong smell through the exhaust. All was ok. So I checked the timing and to my surprise it was out by three teeth the misery is why did the timing jump? I had a new belt fitted last Friday and had the timing reset started the car and it died. Yesterday I was looking at the engine bay and noticed that the crank sensor looming that is located just behind the AUX belt had been sliced and cut by the AUX belt this would had caused the crank sensor to send error messages and could be the reason why my belt jumped out of timing.
so to cut a long and painful journey and to put an end to this desastre I've ordered a new second hand engine that will arrive tomorrow.

 

I would stick with OEM manufacturers for timing belts. When I did mine, I bought a Bando TB298, which is supposed to be the original equipment on these cars.

 

Agreed! Part of what makes Toyotas reliable is their excellent quality OEM parts. I would go as far as not only buying the timing belt from the OEM manufacturer, but buy it from a Lexus dealer as well. Sometimes (not always) parts manufacturers use a different manufacturing specification for making parts for Toyota vs making them for resale to the public. A part this critical is worth spending the extra bucks on!

 

So, most of us on here purchased inferior Aisin timing belt kits...can you help us understand how inferior the kits are or perhaps you could tell us if Aisin is one of those companies...

 

Aisin is 30% owned by Toyota. The components in the kit are in fact OEM. Clearly not inferior. (I did get the tongue in cheek)

 

I have not done the research to know if Aisin is one of these companies. If you have and can vouch for their product, I'm all ears, and that's why I joined this club and forum. I'll be looking at doing a timing belt on my SC in the future and welcome the information. I've done two Toyota timing belts in the past and spent the extra money to by all the parts from the dealer. The only time I deviate from buying OEM parts from Toyota is when fail prematurely, such as my wife's ES rotors. Fool me once!

 

I was talking to my parts guy and he informed me that there is only a hand bunch of companies that initially fabricates timing belts. So it doesn't matter what logo has been printed on a timing belt it's mostly made by the same factory.