Installing A Serpentine Belt In A 1998 Ls400

[Bill's Lexus]

Is replacing the serpentine belt something I should tackle? The dealer wanted $180 + tax to do it. I checked around and found prices running from $23 at Auto Zone to a high of $50 delivered, for an original equipment from an online Lexus dealer. I also found a Bando brand online for $30 delivered, which the seller said was an OEM.

I just had the car in for the 60k service and the dealer said the serpentine belt was glazed and cracked (maybe an exaggeration??). The car is about eight years old, but only has 60k miles, isn't this a little early to need replacing?

Does anyone have any suggestions where I could get a diagram or instructions on replacing It.?

Thanks.

Bill

[Threadcutter]

Bill:

The dealer wanted $180 + tax to do it.

I'll do it for $150..........................

I'll bet that from the time that the dealer service guy gets into the car to move it into the shop to change the belt, to the time he gets out of the car after moving it back out will be less than 5 minutes.....................

Does anyone have any suggestions where I could get a diagram or instructions on replacing It.?

Yep:

LexLS

TIS

Reasonably priced OEM parts;

PPL

[sha4000]

fairly simple job that you can do in 5 to 10 minutes

[razahyde]

fairly simple job that you can do in 5 to 10 minutes

yah real easy i did it on my 540i and it took me maybe 2 minutes.....honestly it took me longer to go to home depot to get the torx wrench then it did to swap the belts.

[SKperformance]

You need to remove the air filter shroud intake.

Then use the bar to release the tensioner , slip it off around the fan and reverse to install . Real easy other than it not having a simple bolt hole to remove the tensioner.

[dfkd]

FULL INSTRUCTIONS HERE...

[Bill's Lexus]

Yeah, that was our "good friends" at Lexus of Orlando. Ken Martin said about $80 for the belt and an hour’s labor (didn’t know they charged $100/hr labor). None of this registered true with me, so I "respectively" declined. I guess we have to pay for their new service building, free snacks and car washes.

They nailed me for about $600 for the 60k service, which consisted mostly of replacing fluids. It would have been more except I didn’t let them balance and rotate the tires. I am sure I could have had this done for a lot less somewhere else, but didn’t want just anybody messing with the transmission.

Even with this, I am not too sure how competent their techs are. I had a 94 LS400 that they said had a bad mass air flow meter which wasn’t the case (they install one and it didn’t fix it). I suspected it was an oxygen sensor, they replaced one, but the other had seized and could not be removed without R&R the exhaust manifold. I ended up buying the 98 LS400 before they fixed it.

I have a 1999 GMC Sonoma truck with 50k miles and the people at Valvoline Oil Change wanted to replace the serpentine belt on a few months ago. Today I inspected the belt and it looked fine to me. I would bet the Toyota belt on the Lexus looks just as good, but it is not as easy to check with out removing some things. I will probably replace the belt in a couple months after it cools down here in FL.

[jc19907]

Dealerships love to charge you an hour for every small job they do. I took my car for a simple oil change to a Lexus Dealership in Nashville. The Service Advisor came back to me with a list of things I needed...

He wanted 1500$ to do all the recommended stuff. Strut Bars, new air/cabin air filters, brakes, tranny fluid... I declined most all of it and three years later, my car runs and drives beatifully - I did have my brakes done recently - 300$...

Anyway, I just had him do the cabin filter and the oil change. To my suprise, they tried to charge me a half hour of labor just to change out the cabin filter... I immediately took the advisor over to my car, opened the glove box and removed the filter and reinstaled it 2 times in less than a minute or two. Needless to say, they removed the labor to do that... Nice try, but not so fast! Labor was about 40 bucks on that... What a rip off. That is the only poor experience I've had at a Lexus Dealership. I mostly take my car to a Toyota Dealership where former Lexus mechanics work.