Did someone say Dephaser?

[Bob the Frog]

I have a simple question.

My Dephaser's on the way out - annoying since the Ren specialist (who did use all the special toolz and did seem painfully aware of how wrong it could go) changed my belt + tensioner + Waterpump just a year ago. CS search tuned up the normal symptoms:
Clicky from timing pulley area,
Dissapears above 2000rpm
Not there When cold etc...
So... De-phaser it is. I have to admit to being pleased: I originally thought it was the tappets.

Question is this: I'm aiming to take the clio off the road to spend some time and money on turning it into a track-day machine. There's maybe only a couple more months of road usage left for it until I get choppy.

Will anything (apart from my ears and pride) suffer if I leave the dephaser un-changed until I take the car out of action for a bit?

Cheers,

/Nick

 

[sideways danny]

Hi Nick.

There's nothing that can actually fail, so driving will be ok until you have it fixed, but as the pulley deteriorates you'll find a lot more flat spots in normal driving.

May well be worth doing an oil change, but often the damage is done.

 

[Bob the Frog]

Cheers Danny

Oil has been changed bi-annually without fail... and given that I'll be giving it a fairly comprehensive thrashing and probably fitting different cams, I reckon I'll take the opportunity to replace the de-phaser at the same time.

When the time comes I'll come begging for advice