timing belt question

Neither. If you look in the Maintenance Log that comes with the car, timing belt replacement is indicated every 60K miles.

The timing-CHAIN equipped engines obviously don't need a timing BELT change.

Thanks Brian

Brian Nystrom wrote:

Actually, check your manual carefully. I believe the interval for the timing belt for your car is 105,000 miles (or 7 years).

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Did that change in '07? Is it just for California cars, as it was previously?

I finally was able to check the service schedule in the owner's manual for 07 Elantra. Inspect timing belt at 60k & 120k replace at 90k and 150k.

I believe the interval changed for the '07 Elantra and '07 Santa Fe. 90k and then 150k, as jp has posted, however, seems to make little sense.

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Which raise the question: Is there an easy way to inspect the timing belt or is it just about as labor intensive as changing it?

Not visible at all until you disassemble a lot of stuff. If you get to the point of inspection, it is only a few minutes more to change it. IMO, it is not worth the risk to stretch the interval.

It's often not terribly instructive to check the timing belt. It's possible to tell that the timing belt is about ready to fail because the teeth are starting to crack and strip off, but that means you'd need to have inspected it when failure is immediately imminent. It's entirely possible to check at every oil change, have the timing belt look fine, and then have it fail prior to the next scheduled oil change. Better to just replace it at the specified interval.

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