Recently there was an exchange posted concering replacement of 960 timing belts. I did mine Saturday. All things considered, it was easier than replacing the belts on my 740. Here are a few hints if you inclined to do this yourself.

Start by removing the electric fan. Take out the two screws and then pull the wiring loom connectors from the shroud. Then you can just put the fan on top of the overflow reservoir/ac dryer and you don't have to take the battery out etc.

Remove the acc belt (I use a 3/4 in adapter on my 1/2 drive breaker bar).

Take off front cover. I changed the plugs at the same time so I left the plugs out so it is easier to turn the crankshaft pully to align the timing marks on the cam pullys. I used either an 1 and 1/4 socket to turn the crank. The notch on the crankshaft pully is hard to find. You have to look straigh down; its on the back side hub of the pully. The matching mark is on the back of the plastic timing belt cover (which is not removed).

Get them all lined up,then remove the top bolt from the belt tensioner. Then back out the bottom bold about 1/4 to 1/2 inch. Then you can twist the tensioner which will pop the plunger from its position. Then you can take it off and remove the belt (there is a metal guard held on by two bolt behind the crankshaft pully that must be removed from under the car).

Put the new belt on. The manual says start at the crankshaft pully then work up and around in a counter clockwise direction.

You have to compress the tensioner before installation. I put it in a vise (the vise has to open about 6 inches to hold the tensioner. If you were hard pressed, I think you could do this in a large c-clamp. The resistance on the tensioner is significant. I found that turning the vise about a 1/4 turn then waiting about 3 to 4 minutes before the next turn worked well. When you get it compressed, there is a keeper hole (make sure you line up the hole before you compress the tensioner) into which you must insert a pin to hold it in the compressed position. I used a 1/16 inch drill bit.

Then you put the tensioner back on. I found that putting the top bolt in first worked best. You can push the bottom of the tensioner to get the bottom bold lined up. If you do it the other way, you have try to pull the tensioner (working from the passenger side of the car).

Now you rotate the engine two revolutions and check the allignment. Guess what. Mine didn't line up as well as I would have liked. The cam pullies were fine but the crankshaft pully was slightly "advanced" (maybe 5 degrees). I did it all again.

Same result. I took it off and did it a third time making doubly sure I had all the belt lugs where they should be.

Same result. I spun the engine with the starter (with the plugs still out). All seemed well. I bolted her up, put in the Bosch +4's, started the car and went for a test drive. Runs fine.

Two notes of caution. If you leave the plugs out for anything, put the ignition coil cover back on. Those openings look just like a funnel designed to put a dropped screw/nut into the cylinder. Second, don't leave plugs in too long between changes. If they seize up and break off when you try to remove them (as I have heard happens fairly regularly), you got real problems. I put penetrating oil around mine before I removed them and even so, they were uncomfortably tight with only 50 k on the car.

Happy wrenching to you all.

p.s. I really don't know how long that all took because I did several other things during the chore. I suspect I could do it today in 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours.