timing belt necessity, warranty concerns
 

Hi everyone,

First post, thanks for having and contributing to this great site.
I bought an 02 Accord V-6 last month with only 20,000 miles on it. A little old ladies car, or so they told me. The car is super clean, garage kept, and had all the regular maintenance per carfax.

At my first oil change Honda informed me I should have the timing belt replaced. While only at 20k on the clock, it is past the 7 year reccomended replacement mark. At an $895 asking price, it is not a repair to be taken lightly.
So what do you think? should it be done? age vs. mileage considered.
I've also read that they replace the tensioner and water pump when they do the timig belt. Why is this so? What about if it isn't broke don't fix it?

I bought an extended warranty when I bought the car from Honda. Apparently the warranty is through a third party called The Warranty Group. Does anyone have experience with these guys?
Now an additional twist... My brother is professional VW mechanic and could change the timing belt saving me $700. With using OEM Honda parts and saving the reciepts, would having my bro cahnge the belt void or otherwise effect the warranty?

Thanks in advance


Dan

Welcome: sounds great car - and can imagine your questioning the age vs. mileage thing in your case.
If me, I'd drive it a month and then decide, just 'cuz I always try to drive a car a bit before I have it worked on.

can't imagine a problem there, but asking us a question about an insurance policy means ... you're asking the wrong people.

If it were my car I personally would get it done. Its just that the consequences of a broken one are pretty harsh, so I'd hate to risk it.

I would have your brother do it and not tell the insurance company. The tensioner is good to replace because if that breaks its basically the same as if the timing belt breaks. The water pump is just replaced because in order to replace it you have to take the timing belt off, so if it breaks later on its a pain to replace, but its only an extra 10 minutes when the timing belt is off.

For your brother, I'd get a proper shop manual, at least the download kind. Just so you guys are certain to recognize the relationship of all the timing marks. There's a few differences Honda vs. VW. Not enough to prevent him from doing it, just don't take for granted his "normal knowledge".

All good to know. Thanks, you guys are awesome

Thinking about the shop manual...
If your brother is a mechanic, he might already have a subscription to Mitchell or some "online shop manual" like that. If so he can probably look up what he needs.

As far as the tensioner and water pump, labor is the most expensive part of the whole repair. If you replaced every part in there you're looking at a couple hundred $ in parts, but the labor won't change much from only changing the belt.