Yesterday I spent 4 hours at the boat shop replacing the T-belt, water pump, drive belts, tensioner, blah blah blah. Four hours because everyone and their mother walked past the shop and stopped to chat. But that's ok.

I finished, started it up, heard 2 snapping sounds, and that was it. Quiet, smooth, the belt ran straight. Buttoned it up and took a boat out in the fog for some swimming (and to clean up from the grease and grime).

Anyway. Last night I woke up in a cold sweat. I remembered putting on the timing belt cover (top) and that the bushing that went around the center bolt hadn't been there when I put it back on.

After many, many timing belt jobs, I remember stupid stuff like this. This morning, I woke up, popped the cover off, and determined that it was indeed gone, victim to disintigration. The metal bushing had gone somewhere, but I knew not where. I assumed (hoped) that it had landed on the shop floor and been swept away with fiberglass and epoxy chunks.

So this morning, I check all the drive belts' tension and hit the road, destination Quad Cities.

Here I am at I-39 and I-88, and my car takes a dump at 85mph. I end up at the side of the interstate, cursing. Once I stopped, I cranked the engine and it wasn't sounding right. Crap. Timing belt. It had to be.

I popped the cover off, and sure enough, the T-belt was ripped right down the middle, although it was still a belt. It had slipped six or seven teeth and was totally fouled. But NO PROBLEM... I carry a spare.

So here I am, figuring 45 minutes and I'll be the hell outta there. But I forgot the breaker bar and the socket for the crank pulley.

I called the hook.

An eighty dollar tow to Sawyer Imports in De Kalb yielded me a $300 dollar bill overall. Two hours later I was back on I-88 going home. The service tech had pulled out that rotten metal bushing, now mashed into a curved shape. It HAD fallen into the works, sometime when I was putting in the upper timing belt cover.

After UMPTEEN timing belt jobs on Volvos and others, I had ignored what I thought might have happened, because "it's my car... what's the worst that could happen?"

And it happened! These timing belt covers disintigrate to such a point that pieces fall off when you remove/replace them. You do have to be careful about this! In my case, the entire metal tube/bushing had fallen into the works, and at some point had shifted enough to get snagged in the timing belt and ruin it.

So, I was out the money I WOULD have saved by doing the job. I would've never let this slip past with my parents' cars, or customers' cars... but my own, I figured I'd just wing it, but it STILL would've had to be against ALL odds. But it was NOT against odds... It happened. Ruined my day, and cost me a nice chunk of change.

BTW, Sawyer Imports was really cool. They had the car out the service bay doors within 2 hours. (Book lists 1.75, but we know how that goes). All told, I was once again reminded how Chicagoans are NICE despite what people say.

Anyway, when you put that belt cover back on, look at it from every angle and make SURE you don't drop[ a piece of it into the lower part, with predictable results.