Had a new water pump and cambelt, car feels like it’s brand new, is this normal?

Posted by theslowrunningexpert@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 10 comments

I bought a car back in November, a 2005 Golf. At the weekend my water pump went and as part of getting that replaced the bloke also did my cambelt as the car is on 145k miles and still had the original on. I’ve only driven about 40 minutes but jesus christ my car feels so different. Despite the car being 2.0l it always seemed to struggle to get to 70 quick enough, and I put that down to it being an SDI (so lack of turbo) whereas coming home it seemed like a completely different car. Nippy, responsive, seemed to shift better, and just so much smoother. Is this much improvement usual or is this pure placebo?

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10 Comments

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GordonLivingstone@reddit

Are you sure it was the original belt? The only obvious reason for an improvement would be that the timing was wrong with the old belt

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theslowrunningexpert@reddit (OP)

It was either the originak, or he might’ve said it was dated 2007. Out of the water pump and belt, one was original and one was 2007.

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Gunny-Guy@reddit

It might have stretched slightly causing the timing to be slightly out. Very lucky if it was almost 20 years old!

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s1pp3ryd00dar@reddit

Sdi will be PD injection (camshaft directly operates pump-injectors) So the cam timing also affects injection timing. VW also have adjustable cam pulleys so you can precisely adjust the timing (in contrast to engines that use a keyway on the pulley, so not adjustable beyond one tooth on the belt). With PDs it was commonplace to tweek the cam timing to get better fuel economy/performance. The same tweek works on SDIs.

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notraulmoat@reddit

My vw golf gtd was the exact same when I got a new clutch and flywheel honestly felt like a completely new spanking car couldnt belive it

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thegerbilmaster@reddit

Clutch makes a huge difference imo not compared to a timing belt

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Competitive_Scene_63@reddit

Possible, if it’s SDI they have an adjustable cam pulley, so possible the torsion value was out and they’ve reset it closer to how it should be from factory. Have a look at VW PD 1.9Tdi torsion value videos on YouTube, same thing.

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TheAngryBad@reddit

Did the mechanic disconnect the battery? (was the stereo, clock etc all reset?) If so, it's possible the engine's ECU has been reset and it's now recalibrating itself, which can make a difference. Modern (and yes, 2005 is modern enough for this) cars will tune themselves based on sensor data. If it's had a lifetime of crappy fuel, dirty filters etc then it can tune itself for reliability/economy rather than performance. But if it's been reset it'll have forgotten all this and is now relearning. I don't know VWs, but I know my Saab got a noticeable boost in performance after I unhooked the battery for a weekend.

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MekkaTorquey@reddit

I mean, there's a chance the timing belt was slightly out of phase. If it's slightly out, maybe just by 1/2 teeth it wouldn't be enough to demolish the engine but would impact performance/fuel consumption.

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