Go with the guys @ High Performance House. They really know their stuff, and are pretty honest in my experience. We had a 914 there for an engine swap that they did an awesome job on. Wasn't *that* expensive :-)

Peter

 

All I can say is take your baby to the good guys. That is the only reason I goto weissach. They maybe a little bit more than anyone else but the work is flawless and CUSTOMER SERVICE!+++++++++++++++++++++++

 

That's FAR less likely to happen than a belt snapping.

 

Uh, no. I've only heard of two and one was low miles under warranty.

I know many many people with 200k+ miles on the original chain.

Sorry Matt, but you are dead wrong here. The single most common failure on the SR20 is.......... spun bearing (a common 944 problem). No, the chains last a long long long long long long long time.

 

Thanks Peter, yeah Rich and Larry do good work and are stand up guys. They are replacing a rubber centered clutch on my car right now. I thought I would do that myself until I read that the rear transaxle comes off. I don't have enough time off for that!

 

jonnybgood -
sorry to hear about your expensive job. i would say go with the people you can trust to do the job right and will stand behind their committment (HPH sounds like the right group). i have had issues with parts charges in the past and it's ridiculous. i paid $2500 in june to simply PUT THE TOP END BACK TOGETHER - only parts required were the tensioner and belts. i had already taken it apart and had the head repaired and bought the camshafts.

repairing these cars can be major $$$ that's why I have started doing everything myself. in the past 6 months i've probably saved $3000 in labor charges by doing it myself.

 

Not many engines are ALUSIL like these. I dont know the expansion ratio of alusil vs common aluminum engines. The engine do expand quite a bit, and there is quite a difference in the balance belt tension from cold to hot.

Regards
Eirik Kvello-Aune
www.944968.com

 

BMW uses Alusil and chains.

George - I have seen dozens of timing chain failures and never seen a spun bearing on one.
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Think this one through a bit. It's not going to expand so much that a chain tensioner couldn't handle it. In fact, a chain would be safer than a belt in a case with a great deal of thermal expansion because of the tensioner.

Again, if it expanded enough that chain tension were an issue, that would be the least of the designers' worries.

 

I was told that the addition of silicon LOWERS the thermal expansion coefficient of aluminum and aids in the casting behavior by decreasing the viscosity.

 

Then you are the only person in the country that I know of Matt.

I have a database of literally thousands of people and hundreds of millions of miles to draw on. Only two chain issues in all of that. Spun bearings are another story, especially in the G20 which usually comes with a slushbox. About 75% less spun bearings in SE-Rs with the same engine. Best guess is the engine truly must be revved more. Even the manual G20s spin bearings less. It's surmised that the engine needs to see higher revs regularly to get the oil pressure up enough to keep all of the galleys clean.

SR20s are roughly as prone to spun bearings as the 944 from what I have seen.

 

I guess in the repair end people dont come to you when the motor is toast, which would explain why I never saw that. They do come to you when it is not starting or making an awful noise from the top. I can recall at least 3 Stanzas that I bought from the customers because they didnt want to repair, then fixed them and sold them. I am assuming the Stanza 2.0 is the same as the other Nissan 2.0 (200SX, Sentra). It may not be, not a lot of G20s to work on (seems most visit the dealer).

BTW - how are you coming on my roll cage :>)
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Ah, now the Stanza has a different engine (KA24DE - same as the 240SX and few trucks), but I'm still suprised to hear you've seen some chain problems with them.

I won't be able to work on bending the tubes for a few weeks. The bender is going to Albuquerque for a few weeks to get the Sentra cage in. I have to wire my garage for 220 this weekend to work on some of the welding.

I'd highly recommend doing just a rollbar and not a cage. A cage in a 944 road car will be way too close to your head.

 

Where do you think we can bolt the bar too? It would be nice to incorporate a harness for 5/6pt belts to the rollbar, is it possible?
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OK, first of all, we could still weld a rollbar in, but bolt-in would probably be better. We might have to cut a hole from below to insert bolts/nuts to secure the main hoop. The rear downtubes can be secured with bolts in the rear shock mounts, or longer rear shock mounting bolts that go through the rollbar mounts.

We definitely can incorporate a harness bar.