5sfe Damaged/Dented Timing Belt Guide
 

Hello, Everyone:

I have a 1998 Toyota Camry with the 2.2L 5SFE engine. After replacing my broken timing belt, I noticed there was a strange rubbing/friction sound coming from the lower timing belt cover.

When I removed the lower cover, I noticed the timing belt guide was slightly dented in one spot and look like it had incurred quite a bit of friction in that spot. The dent was pressed in towards the belt side of the guide.

I have no idea how this could have happened. In the attached pictures you can see the damaged spots. I was able to get it flat again with a shop rag and a hammer.

My question is, do I have to replace this now? Is there any reason to think this will destroy the belt?

I know this wasn't the original cause of failure as I had to re-time it twice because I had it a tooth off the first time, and the noise was not present until timing it the second time.

Thanks!

my thoughts
turns at crank speed and thats significant revs

in the worst spot .. teeth of belt use it

when I zoom in a lot on your first picture inside the red circle
my eyes see ..the dent looks like a right angled crack in the metal

you are correct to be concerned
.if isnt smooth that rubbing sound will in time feather the edge of the timing belt

you might like to persist and try and restore the running surface
wet and dry sand paper may help

Toyota sells the part for under $7.

Work on it with a file to knock down the high points that might rub on the belt. Then sand the area smooth.

Toyo, do you know what the part number is on that for $7? When I called Toyota earlier today, they quoted me $18 for it. Maybe they didn't know which component I was talking about.

I tried carefully sanding it down to smooth it out and I'm not really sure if it helped or not. The noise went away then came back and went away again. It seemed like when I really listened carefully, it was coming from the water pump housing.

A friend of mine is a tech at Chevy and he was telling me sometimes if you don't burp all the air out of the system, they can make strange sounds like that. That makes sense to me, however, it was just weird that it didn't make that sound the first time I ran it with the incorrect timing.

I'm putting it back together for now, and then I'm going to go order that piece and put it in asap. I have to be able to drive for now and it seems as though it'll be okay for now.

Thanks so much for help, guys!

Is this the part?

1998 TOYOTA Camry 2200CC 16-VALVE DOHC EFI, AUTOMATIC CRANKSHAFT & PISTON

P/N 1356774010

Do you follow the procedures requiring rotating the crank pulley CW. Then stopping at a specified location before tightening the idler pulley?

Toyo, are you talking about the 13566A part in the diagram? It's definitely the part I'm talking about for my car, but the one in the diagram seems like it's a different shape. Almost like it's a "deep-dish" style guide whereas mine looks a lot more flat. Maybe it just looks like that in the picture for some reason.

Yeah I did tighten down the tensioner after 1-78 turns at the 45 degree mark the first time. I don't remember if I did the second time or not. I still don't understand the difference between tightening down at 45 degrees or 0 degrees.

Is this the part photo?

https://www.google.com/search?q=1356...iw=820&bih=483

The different angle of crank. Means a different belt tension by the cams lobes that are loaded by the valve springs

Yeah that first result that comes up look like it. Duh, I didn't think about the angle changing the tension. That makes sense. Luckily, when I was in there, I pulled the tensioner up a little bit by hand to take out some of the slack because I was reading somewhere that people aren't getting the proper tension out of the spring by itself and were still getting the timing belt slapping against the cover. Now I'm thinking that's probably happening to people because they're not tightening it down at 45°. Thanks, Toyo.