Distributor rattling

[Phil Rose]

At 7:01 AM -0800 1/27/04, Bernie Benz wrote:
>Bentley says tight enough that you can just twist its longest span 1/4 turn.
>This is not quite tight enough, IMO.

I'll assume that you have "cured" (one or more) distributor rattle 
situations by retightening the timing belt to just beyond that "1/4 
turn" spec? Of course the basic problem with Audi's (and most other) 
belt-tightening specs, is the lack of an objective means to establish 
the force--torque in this case--to be used. Over time...and many 
t-belt jobs...one presumably gets the required "feel" for belt 
tension, but otherwise...it's a pretty darn vague kind of spec.

Ingolstadt's assembly line possibly has a specialist (Karl, the 
300-lb Monkey Lad)  who does nothing all day but twist timing belts. 
;-)

Phil

P.S. I used my own personal version of that  "1/4 turn spec" for the 
t-belt I replaced on the red car, last year; and there's been no 
significant distributor rattle. However it did rattle a lot before 
the belt change, and the old belt did seem quite loose.
-- 

Phil Rose				Rochester, NY USA
'91 200q	(140K, Lago blue)
'91 200q   (64K, Tornado red)			mailto:pjrose at frontiernet.net