3L Timing Belt / Water Pump Instructions

I found this online but thought I would share here as I was having trouble finding directions for this model...
Hiace 2.8l 3L timing belt write up
Thought this might be helpful to others attempting a timing belt job on their 2.8l 3L.
I got my full kit(all seals and new bolts included) and water pump from www.shopraddcruisers.ca
Super helpful guy and very knowledgeable about what parts do and don’t fit these vans so I’ll be using him for all my other service parts.
1. Remove driver seat to give yourself room
2. Remove the radiator fan. 4 bolts that are 12mm. I found it best to use a ratcheting wrench.
3. Drain radiator and remove upper and lower hoses. Makes getting everything else out much easier. Don’t try to remove the radiator just yet. For draining there’s a drain plug (petcock) on the bottom but I found it faster and easier to carefully remove bottom rad hose and let it hush out into a catch can. Remove the rad cap as this lets air flow into the system and drain faster. Might as well remove thermostat too and replace that.
4. Loosen power steering pump and remove belt. Two bolts both 14mm. One pivot point bolt(don’t fully remove pivot bolt) and the other is just above it on the slot it swings along.
5. Remove AC compressor. AC belt tensioner is the pulley near the bottom of the engine bay and requires a 14mm or 12mm socket. The lines are flexible and the whole unit can be moved around fairly easily once the 4 small 12mm bolts are removed. One bolt on the top right won’t come all the way out as it’s blocked by a hard line but should cause any issues. Used a 12mm socket for the other 3 and a 12mm ratchet wrench for the blocked bolt.
6. Remove bracket AC compressor is attached to. Large 17mm bolts with a lot of torque so a decent 3/8 drive ratchet is decent. Carful of the vacuum hoses running through this area and alternator wiring.
7. Loosen alternator pulley located just below where the AC compressor was and on the front of the alternator. There’s two bolts to loosen, one is what moves the alternator along its pivot point and the other is the pivot point bolt. No need to remove the pivot bolt, just loosen enough for it to swing and removed the belts.
8. Remove pulley rad fan was attached to.
At this point you should have a pretty wide open engine bay with no belts and the water pump exposed. You’ll move down to the harmonic balancer (pulley on the bottom that drives all the belts via the crank shaft)
9. Remove 4 small 12mm bolts and the first two pulleys should come off easily.
10. Now you’ll need a way to remove the crank bolt. I made my own tool using a thick piece of steel with a hole drilled and reused one of the small 12mm bolts to attach this tool to the pulley. The crank bolt is torqued down to something like 170ftlb so you’ll need a very large 1/2in drive ratchet or breaker bar and either a tool you make or rent to stop the engine from turning over while removing this bolt.
11. Once the crank bolt is removed you can take off the harmonic balancer. There are special tools you can rent to remove this that work great. Some balancers just slide off while others (mine) are seized and require a lot of work to remove. DO NOT LOOSE THE SHAFT KEY. It may or not come loose so be aware it’s very important.
12. After the balancer is off you should have a bare crank shaft and nothing blocking the timing belt cover. Start removing the handful of 10mm bolts all around the cover and near the water pump.
13. Remove the cover and get ready to start installing new parts!
14. There’s a small thin shim on the crank shaft, grab that and place it with the timing cover making sure the orientation (facing in our out) is not mixed up. Not sure how much this matters but it looks like it has a specific install direction so best to keep it that way.
15. Remove the tensioner by first loosing the set bolt in the middle. That should allow it to move. Next remove the mounting bolt. I used a pair of pliers to compress the small spring and remove that before tanking the tensioner off. Install new tension and spring.
16. Loosen the idler pulley by removing the bolt in the center. Install new pulley and new bolt in kit.
17. DO NOT REMOVE TIMING BELT JUST YET. Make your own marks on the belt and gears to ensure you get everything lined up perfectly again. Yes there are factory marks but it’s more reassuring to have fresh marks you already know work fine. Now remove the belt.
18. Remove cam gear (top of engine) to replace the seal behind it. Be careful not to mess up the orientation (front face from back face). Use either a small pick or small flat head screw driver to remove the old seal. Double check you have the correct seal before doing this as it’s common to damage it when removing. Apply some grease to the new seal and take care to install it evenly and seat it flush with the face. I used a socket large enough to sit on the entire seal to tap it into place. If you don’t have that a small flat head screw drive with a towel wrapped around the end so you don’t damage the seal works well too with gentle tapping. Re-install cam pulley.
19. Now follow the same process for removing/installing the crank shaft seal (main seal) as the cam seal.
20. Now remove the old water pump via 12mm bolts. Be careful as there is probably still coolant left in here and can make a big splash on everything down below. Ask me how I know…
21. Install new water pump and seal. Your new water pump should come with a seal in the box.
22. Now you’re ready for the timing belt. Install the crank bolt so you can use this to turn the gears to confirm proper timing with the new belt.
23. Installing the timing belt is a little tedious and annoying in the cramped space but take your time and go slow. I pulled the the tensioner fully open and tightened it down so it was easier to slip the new belt on.
24. I started at the injection pump (pulley on the middle right) and worked my way down to the crank, then tensioner/idler, and finally over the cam. I had issues with all the slack in the belt building up at the injector and when tensioned it would skip a tooth or two and rotate the crank shaft. I solved this by over compensating the crank shaft a tooth or two so that when tensioned it would rotate back in time and be nice and tight.
25. Once the belt is on rotate everything using the crank bolt at least 4 full revolutions and confirm all your marks make it back to their original locations. It will be hard to turn but should move relatively smoothly. As long as your cam and crank is in time you should cause any major damage.
26. Once you’re confident everything is timed right you can start the engine and check there’s no new noises (bad timing). Of course make sure nothing is in the way of the timing belt moving and you’ll be fine to run it for a few seconds.
27. Now put it all back together! I took the opportunity to install a new radiator and belts since it’s all been removed already. Also a side note on new belts, you’ll need to check/re tension them after a few hundred miles. All of them are easy to tension besides the power steering pump. I had to take a long bar and set it on top the pump and use my body weight to push it down while fighting the pivot bolt. Without doing this it would squeal at full turn.
Hope this helps!

Hello. Really helpful and useful, thanks for posting. I agree with the work here.

If you’re removing the radiator I’d recommend giving the cooling system a good back flush. I wrote a long post in my show us yours section on the coolant system and my experiences to date. As an aside I now have the front heater matrix back from its rebuild and I need to update that post there.

You said you fitted a new radiator. What did you fit, please? I opted for a re-core and with a triple-layer rather than the original double.

Good advice on the harmonic balancer (crank pulley). Mine came off very easily but these can be a real pain. They are also quite brittle and it’s quite easy to chip part off it with prybars etc. I’d strongly suggest not using these if it’s stubborn.

Thanks!

Thanks, I've replaced the alternator with help from a great post so next I might try this as I've done up to step 10. Anyway like LH119V said any help on rads is helpful. Nightmare trying to get one in the UK Thanks again