First question. Well I thought I'd gotten OK at replacing timing belts, I'm on my third with no problems, but I ran into a puzzle. I'm working on a B230 engine. When I lined up the sprockets and crankshaft pulley with the old belt on at TDC for #1 piston, I found that the camshaft and aux shaft marks were lined up as they should be. However, the crankshaft position doesn't seem right. The small notch in the belt guide washer was about 1/2 tooth CCW from the embossed mark on the seal carrier. The timing mark on the balancer pulley was at 10 degrees BTDC according to the marks on the T-belt cover, not at 0 degrees as I thought it should be. In the past I've just used the marks on the seal carrier and the belt guide washer and they have lined up.

I went ahead and slipped the new belt on starting at the place on the crank sprocket where the notch on the guide washer was located. The marks on the new belt matched the marks on the other two sprockets as they should but the two marks on the belt at the crank sprocket were just to the left (CCW) from the embossed mark on the carrier. The notch on the guide washer, the aux sprocket, and the cam sprocket seem to be where they should be. My question is, do we use the notch in the outer belt guide washer as the position marker for the crank sprocket or do we use the embossed part on the seal carrier?

Second question. Should the timing mark on the harmonic balancer pulley line up with the 0 dgree mark on the belt cover when piston 1 is at TDC? Since mine is at 10 degrees BTDC, I wonder if the rubber in the balancer is starting to slip. The car has about 220,000 mi. and the balancer may be original. If it was squealing, I couldn't hear it over the awful belt noise (I'm replacing belts and acc. bushings also). I'm now looking at the forward face of the pulley. I can see 5 or 6 radial cracks across the rubber. Where the inner metal of the balancer meets the rubber, the rubber is slightly raised and looks like the is rust on the rubber. Could this show slipping between the rubber and inner metal? Where the outer part on the pulley meets the rubber, the rubber looks slightly separated but a knife point won't go very far in.

Third question. When I finally got the crankshaft pulley bolt out, I found it had a liberal amount of something like Loctite on it. (Took a breaker bar with a pipe added for added leverage to move it.) The Bentley doesn't say to use a thread locker. I've just torqued it to 44 ft lb + 60 degrees more. What do you folks on the BB use?

Thanks for your insight into this. Maybe it's all OK but then it may not be.