EGR Valve replaced, yeah for me

[rit14623]

Well, about three weeks ago, my car started having idle problems and it took a couple of cranks to get the car started. I had recently replaced the coils, wires and spark plugs so it wasn't that. So, to prevent the car from stalling out because it wouldn't hold steady while idling, I had to rev it about 1000+ RPM. Sometimes I would see if it could idle on its own and it was very rough and jumping between 200 RPM and 800 RPM, it would trigger the check engine light which was P0300.

I replaced the timing belt two weeks ago because it was over 90,000 since the last change. Since that was a bigger job that I could handle, I had a dealership do it along with the water pump. Anyway, that didn't fix the idle issue but the car did run a little bit smoother.

This weekend, I replaced the EGR valve and that fixed it. I flipped the old EGR valve over and shaked it out and a bunch of carbon deposits fell out. Nothing big though. That was puzzling. The insides were very dirty though. I removed the screws holding the two pieces of the EGR valve together and I manually depressed the valve while shaking the EGR valve. Out came a small piece of metal... it was thin and small. I shook it again and another piece came out. That was it for weird pieces coming out but I don't know where those pieces came from. They were about 3mm odd-oval shaped and very thin. Covered in carbon deposits but the edges were rounded.

 

[Fraya713]

Sounds like VICs solenoid that they've recalled, but I hardily know enough about cars to know if those would end up in your EGR or not.
I do know that they recalled the VICs butterflies because they would fall into the engine and f some sh!t up, so they would just remove them.
Might be nice to have a picture of these odd metal pieces..

EGR's are a known problem in these cars as well, I've replaced mine with a canadian one and it's worked very well and is supposed to do well in cold/wet climates.

How much did it end up costing you for the timing belt replacement? I'm getting close to be due for mine and want to know how much in the hole I'll be getting into..

 

[rit14623]

Sounds like VICs solenoid that they've recalled, but I hardily know enough about cars to know if those would end up in your EGR or not.
I do know that they recalled the VICs butterflies because they would fall into the engine and f some sh!t up, so they would just remove them.
Might be nice to have a picture of these odd metal pieces..

EGR's are a known problem in these cars as well, I've replaced mine with a canadian one and it's worked very well and is supposed to do well in cold/wet climates.

How much did it end up costing you for the timing belt replacement? I'm getting close to be due for mine and want to know how much in the hole I'll be getting into..

I was charged $399 for timing belt/labor and $200 for water pump/labor. Since the timing belt has to be off to replace the water pump, I thought I would do both. This was a Mazda dealership so it could be cheaper elsewhere.

 

[Jackie chan]

$200 for the water pump? geez

If youve got the belts off, the pump only takes like 5 minutes to replace.

but I could see it being 200 if you werent doing the timing belt and had to dig all the way back in there.

 

[rit14623]

$200 for the water pump? geez

If youve got the belts off, the pump only takes like 5 minutes to replace.

but I could see it being 200 if you werent doing the timing belt and had to dig all the way back in there.

Yeah, I know. The pump itself was around $130 (I know, there's a mark up there too) so $70 in labor is a lot for something that didn't take a half hour total of removing coolant line, undoing bolts, installing the new gasket and water pump and putting back the coolant connection. But, since they were working on the timing belt, it would be easy for the mechanic to do while he was down there. I'm a grease monkey but there are some things I am not able to tackle yet, like the timing belt. I saw it on youtube and this dude did it without specialty tools but the hardest parts seemed to be 1. getting the crank pulley bolt off and 2. torqued back on, and 3. keeping the cams aligned while putting the new belt on. He didn't have any specialty tools which made it appear harder than it seemed.

 

[Installshield 2]

Timing belt is annoying...i just did it for a cam install this past saturday...and yeah, the crank pulley bolt pretty much requires access to air and a good impact wrench...and even then it can take a while if it hasn't been removed in a while...i installed a UDP a few weeks ago, and that time it literally took 5+ minutes of hitting that bolt just to back it out...but for the other day, it went smoothly...

the hardest part of the timing belt, aside from that bolt...is simply getting the belt back on properly...and for the exact same reasons...the crank can easily be turned...and the belt is still extremely tight even with the tensioner completely out of the way...so when you slide the belt over the cam gears and the crank...its more likely than not that something will move a tooth or so...it took a friend an I about 10 tries before we got it right...

next time i'll paint the belt, since i'm reusing it...that way you're completely aware of which specific tooth gets on each part of the belt...and there is no incorrect eye-balling or anything...

anyway glad you found it...i've never done anything to my egr valve, and i think its time i look into that...with these new cams my idle is pretty wacky anyway, and the way the revs fall on throttle lift...is making me think the egr system isn't helping anything...