Timing belt change interval
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Sounds like you had the car serviced by the dealer. If you did the 60k mile service, the tech would have check for condition of the belt as well.
Back in the late 90s, my wife's camry had the 60k service. Dealer called me to just change the belt since (for got what spring was broken) needed to be worked on anyways (under warranty... dealer helped me with it). But did tell me the belt was still good, but might as well change it since they needed to work around that area.
So if they said it is okay, it should not be an issue. Being it is a lexus dealership, the customer service relationship should be even better.
Back in the late 90s, my wife's camry had the 60k service. Dealer called me to just change the belt since (for got what spring was broken) needed to be worked on anyways (under warranty... dealer helped me with it). But did tell me the belt was still good, but might as well change it since they needed to work around that area.
So if they said it is okay, it should not be an issue. Being it is a lexus dealership, the customer service relationship should be even better.
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...not to sound like a jerk but you can NOT tell a timing belt's condition visually. It's impossible. You can tell if it's indeed trash but you can't tell that it's -not- trash. Timing belts break that look great all the time. Guess why that is?
Several years back I did the timing belt on my LS400, it was a 91 with 119k miles and it had the original timing belt, about 13 years old at the time. This is pretty typical for lexus vehicles.
I'd loosely estimate that you have between a 1-5% of having the belt fail. The 5% is because if by some chance during a radiator flush, brake fluid replacement service, etc., if a technician, or anyone else for that matter, spilt any of those fluids on the t-belt it can cause it to wear prematurely and rapidly.
If I was you, I'd get it replaced if you plan on keeping the car a little longer. Why? You are going to pay for it anyways when you sell the car plus you take an additional risk. Anyone [including a dealer] is going to ask for proof if your lexus has the t-belt job done. They are going to take that right off the top of the price if you haven't. I bought/sold used cars including lexus for years. People know the service isn't cheap and the odds of someone being clueless enough not to notice is low.
Whether or not to use the dealer is another story. I've never owned a non v8 lexus but those motors are 1200-1800 for the t-belt procedure. The inline 6 is much easier to do IMO, you can probably get it done for under a grand at a lexus shop [if the warranty is still OK with that].
Several years back I did the timing belt on my LS400, it was a 91 with 119k miles and it had the original timing belt, about 13 years old at the time. This is pretty typical for lexus vehicles.
I'd loosely estimate that you have between a 1-5% of having the belt fail. The 5% is because if by some chance during a radiator flush, brake fluid replacement service, etc., if a technician, or anyone else for that matter, spilt any of those fluids on the t-belt it can cause it to wear prematurely and rapidly.
If I was you, I'd get it replaced if you plan on keeping the car a little longer. Why? You are going to pay for it anyways when you sell the car plus you take an additional risk. Anyone [including a dealer] is going to ask for proof if your lexus has the t-belt job done. They are going to take that right off the top of the price if you haven't. I bought/sold used cars including lexus for years. People know the service isn't cheap and the odds of someone being clueless enough not to notice is low.
Whether or not to use the dealer is another story. I've never owned a non v8 lexus but those motors are 1200-1800 for the t-belt procedure. The inline 6 is much easier to do IMO, you can probably get it done for under a grand at a lexus shop [if the warranty is still OK with that].
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