Timing Belts And The Value Of A Mobile Mechanic

A great way to maximize the down time of that vehicle is to have a fleet preventive maintenance mechanic come to your office and do the work there. You don’t have to tie up any labor delivering or picking up the car, and he can handle any other routine replacements or maintenance necessary while he is there. By using the same service and having a long relationship, you ensure your quality and have more peace of mind, because you know the people working on your vehicles. After all, it is not difficult to have over 200,000.00 in vehicles in your fleet, so you want to have that confidence.

Timing belts have a limited amount of time before they must be replaced, but by having a mobile mechanic do the work, you can maximize your time as a business owner. Depending on the type of business you have, your fleet will be different. For instance, if you have a cleaning business, you may have a fleet of compact sedans. If you have an auto parts delivery service,

compact pickups, generally single cab, are more your style. A landscaping company will use at least a three-quarter ton pickup, while a lawn maintenance company might use a half-ton or even compact pickup. Each of these vehicles presents a different set of needs and quirks, but one of the most important is timing belts.

Whether or not a motor needs regular timing belt changes depends, of course, on whether or not it has a belt in the first place (most larger engines have a timing chain). If yours does, you have a serious set of needs to keep up with. Some people are not aware that a timing belt break can be devastating to your engine, usually warranting a complete replacement. The problem occurs because the timing belt controls the cam and the valves. If these get out of sync, you get bent valves, and that is not good. The way to prevent this is to make sure your timing belt gets changed at the proscribed intervals.

Usually, a manufacturer charts timing belt replacement at 80,000 miles, so that is a good base point (always check with your manufacturer, though).

Now, generally speaking, timing belts are fairly deep in the external parts of the engine, so it is necessary to remove many of the parts to get to it; fan belt, fan and clutch assembly, water pump, a tensioner arm or two, sometimes the air conditioner compressor (sometimes this can get really infuriating, especially when it is just the mounting bracket that is in the way!). For this reason, it is a good idea to go ahead and replace all those parts at that time, because you are already paying the labor to replace them. In this way, you get the most bang for your buck when having to replace the timing belt.