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How to Replace Timing Belt 1996-2000 Nissan Pathfinder

Created on: 2018-06-22

How to remove, install, change a worn out, damaged, or broken timing belt on 96, 97, 98, 99, 00 Nissan Pathfinder

Tools needed

  • 14mm Wrench

    Funnel

    Socket Extensions

    Torque Wrench

    Rust Penetrant

    Channel-Lock Pliers

    10mm Wrench

    Anti-Freeze

    1-1/16 Inch Socket

    Flat Blade Screwdriver

    Harmonic Balancer Puller

    Drain Pan

    Ratchet

    1/2 Inch Breaker Bar

    Complete Metric Socket Set

Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto, we've been selling auto parts for over 30 years.

In this video, we are gonna be removing and installing a new timing belt in a 2000 Nissan Pathfinder. If you need this part or other parts for your vehicle, click the link in the description and head over to 1aauto.com.

All right, we're gonna pop the hood right here. Pull that lever. There's a release right here if you go to the center and to the right a little bit. Right there. We're gonna grab the prop rod and put it right there. All right, we're gonna disconnect the negative terminal on the battery, use a 10 millimeter wrench, loosen it up. Get a little looser. You want to pull that up, set that aside. All right. Pull these two clips over here. Right here and right here. There's two clips over here. Then this one gets pulled up from down underneath. Pull up, pull the air filter and use a straight blade screwdriver to pull this hose off. Over here, I'm gonna disconnect the connector right here. There's a button on the back side. Push it down. Pull the connector off. It's the connector for the mass air flow sensor, disconnect that. A little retainer right here, pull that off. Take this clip off right here so we can move the throttle cable out of the way. I'll take this one off too and that one there and just push it out of the way. Next we can use a straight blade screwdriver. Loosen up the worm clamp on the throttle body.

I'm gonna loosen this up, pull that out of the way. I'm gonna pull these hoses of using some channel lock pliers. Pinch the clamp and then twist it back and forth. Do the same for this one. You can pull this box out of the way. If I need to take this lower cover off, I have a 10 millimeter bolt here. There may have been other bolts here, this vehicle is missing some. I'll take this one off.

I use a 10 millimeter socket and extension and a ratchet. Over here, there's a bolt. There's one right here. There may be one right there and right there and right here and pull it down. All right. So this lower part of the fan shroud has to come off. I'm gonna take and grab the center right here and pull it past that little nub right there. I should be able to slide this out. Up here, on the fan shroud, there's a little tab right here, can you see it?

All right. You're gonna push down on that tab. You can pull out and it's gonna release the lower part of the fan shroud. I'll do the same for the other side. A little tricky to get your hands up in here. Let's see. I'll take that piece off. You can rotate it, pull it down, pull it out. These little clips right here on both sides. All right, we're gonna drain the coolant.

This vehicle does not have a petcock on the radiator so what we're gonna do is disconnect the lower radiator hose. We're gonna have something to drain the coolant into. I'll grab it, grab this clamp with some channel lock pliers, move it to the side. We're gonna use one of these picks, like a right angle pick. We actually sell a kit of these at 1aauto.com. You can take it and get right in here. Go all around the hose. That'll loosen it up. Be careful not to get it all over you. You don't want to take a shower in it.

So once that's drained, leave that out of the way. A little bit of rust on this clamp up here. I'm just gonna spray it with some rust penetrant before I try to take off the clamp. I'm gonna get some channel locks to hold it so it doesn't twist while I'm doing this. Just like this. Loosen this bolt up. As I loosen the bolt, it loosens up on the clamp. Pull that clamp aside. All right. I can grab the upper radiator hose, twist it a little bit, peel it off.

Next we're gonna take this hose off right here. There's a clamp right here. You just grab it with your fingers, pinch it pull that off, then we'll pull the hose off over here. That goes to the coolant reservoir. You just set that aside.

Next I'm gonna take this 10 millimeter bolt out on the fan shroud with a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. We'll take this one out as well. Pull that bolt out. Then the fan shroud should be loose. All right, so I'm just gonna pull this up over here. Once I pull that up then I'll be able to clear this hose over here. Pull it up over there gently. Pull it out.

So before we pull the belts off, we're gonna take these nuts for the fan and we're just gonna loosen em up. We're not gonna take em out completely, we just want to crack em free. It'll be easier to do it while the best is still on there. So we take our 10 millimeter wrench, get in here. Just crack it free, crack this one free. Crack this one free. Sometimes you might have to hold the belt if it's really tight. Then this bottom one.

So one those are cracked free, we can take the belts off. First we're gonna take off this AC belt, the tensioner is right here. It's not an automatic tensioner, so it's a manual tensioner. We're gonna have to start by loosening this nut right here on the front of it. It's a 14 millimeter. Just loosen it about a half a turn. Then the adjuster is over here. We're gonna use a 14 millimeter socket and start loosening it. As we loosen it, the best is getting looser. The tensioner is going down.

We can take the belt off here, just like that. Then bring it around the fan. We are reusing these belts because they're new. If we were replacing them, this would not make a difference but we want to label these from where they came off so you don't put them in the wrong spot. We're gonna put AC on this one because it's the AC belt. We'll label the others as we go.

Next we're gonna take off the drive belt. This drives the alternator and the water pump and that's it. The tensioner is right here. We're gonna use a 14 millimeter socket and a ratchet and I'll just crack this free. Just go about a half turn. Then the adjuster is over here on the side. The adjuster for this is a 12 millimeter, so we're gonna use a 12 millimeter socket, an extension and a ratchet. We're gonna loosen this up. That's gonna bring the tensioner up and take the tension off the belt.

Once there's enough tension off the belt, we should be able to slide it off. We take it off here. We go around the fan, just like this. Just like that. This one's the drive belt. So we'll label it drive. All right, we're gonna get this power steering pump belt off. We need to raise the front of the vehicle. We have a 12 millimeter wrench that we're gonna loosen this nut up just a little bit. Crack it free maybe a half turn, maybe a whole turn. That's about good and then the adjuster is over here on the side somewhat hard to get to. It's a 12 millimeter, you can loosen it with a wrench or a ratchet wrench. You might be able to get a small socket and ratchet in there. Try it with a 12 millimeter socket and ratchet. Just loosen this. As we're loosening this, the belt, you can pull on the belt and that will pull the power steering pump down. This is loose enough, I can do it by hand. Just keep pulling it down. All right, so now I'm able to fold the belt up and over and off the power steering pump. Then I'll take it off the crank and pull it down.

All right, to pull the radiator out, I'm gonna take this, these clips are pretty rusty because they're for the transmission cooler, pull these back. Let's see, some channel lock pliers, I'll do the same with this one. I'll use a little pick here, try to get in there and try to twist it. I'm able to twist it and pull it out. I'm gonna put a drain bucket underneath because we're gonna lose some fluid. There, put that out of the way. Do the same for this one, twist back and forth. I'm gonna move this clamp a little more. Now, I can pull it off. Pull that one back.

For the day, I'm gonna use some earplugs and plug up this tranny line and keep it from leaking. Make sure you don't push it in too far, do the same with this one. That'll stop the flow of the tranny fluid while we're letting the lines off. Now we'll take these 10 millimeter nuts off with a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. This one's coming off pretty hard so I'm just gonna work that rust penetrant back and forth a little bit because I don't want to break the stud. Pull this bracket off. I'll do the same for this side. Pull this bracket off. Set that aside. We can grab our radiator and pull that cardboard out of the way. Pull it straight up.

Now that we have the belts off, I'm gonna take the rest of the nuts off of this fan and pull the fan out of our way. Use a 10 millimeter wrench if they're still tight. I'm gonna get the last one almost out, make sure you're holding the fan so it does not fall of. You don't want it to hit the radiator because it could damage the radiator. I'll grab the fan. Pull it gently, you can pull the fan out.

This water pump pulley will come right out. Next we're gonna pull this bracket off. All right, we're gonna take these bolts out of the bracket. That's 12 millimeter socket with a ratchet. This one out down here. Next we'll take this one out. I'll take this nut out--it's a 12 millimeter nut. I'm gonna use a socket and an extension and the ratchet. I just pulled the whole stud out--that's okay. Then we can pull this bracket off.

I'm gonna take this bolt out right here for the bracket that holds this lower radiator hose on. It's a 12 millimeter, I'm using a 12 millimeter socket with an extension and a ratchet. We're gonna loosen up the clamp. It's a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. It's a little rusty, so spray a little rust penetrant on it. We'll let that sit for a second. I'm gonna hold this bracket with some channel lock pliers, then loosen it up. Pull that clamp out of the way. Get in here with our pick. Should be able to twist, grab the hose and twist. Use our pick again. Go all the way around, that'll break the seal on the hose. Now it's loose. Just pry it back and forth, should be able to pull it off, just like that. All right, we're gonna get these electrical connectors disconnected because we want to get this wiring harness out of our way.

This one, we're gonna push down and unlock it that way. This one right here goes to the AC compressor, we're gonna push down. This one here, we're gonna use a flat blade screwdriver, push the connector and then pull it out. This one here, these one's are confusing. This one here, you have to take a flat blade screwdriver and push this all the way down. Push down. Then pull the connector out. I'm gonna push this one all the way down. Sometimes you get some sand in these, it's hard to get these connectors out. You may have to use some compressed air. Pull that out. Do the same for this one over here. Push down there. I'm just gonna push this down and then push down on that. That releases. This ones broken, that's why that one came out different. Push this one in and then push down on the tab. Should be able to pull that out. There we go. All right, I'm gonna use a trimming tool to pull this wire retainer off. It's probably gonna break because it's old and brittle. Yep, it broke. That's okay.

As you can see there's a lot of sand in this one, I'm gonna use some compressed air and try to get the sand out. That's how you get that one out. It was a little tricky, but it did come out, and it didn't break which is a good thing. So we'll put this wire retainer out. I can use needle nose on the back side of this one, squeeze it, pull it through. There's a coolant temp sensor right here. Be careful not to break it. Pull that, that slides right out. There's another retainer for the wires right here. Use some needle nose, pull those out right here. I can fold this wire harness over there. Keep that out of our way.

We need to pull this hose off that connects the two valve covers together. Before I do that, there's an electrical connector right here that goes to the distributor. I want to pull this off like that. Put that out of our way. We can take these two 10 millimeter bolts out. Take that one out. Take this one out. Using a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet.

Next I'll use some pliers, take this hose off. I'm gonna squeeze this clamp and wiggle it back and forth. Wiggle that off. You can do the same over on this side. Squeeze the clamp, wiggle the hose back and forth. We should be able to maneuver this hose out of our way and pull it through. Okay, so we're gonna take this AC compressor out next but these little vacuum lines are in our way. We're gonna pop this line off here. It's not gonna come off easily. I'm gonna use a straight blade screwdriver, try to get underneath it. Pry that out. It will generally lay the way it came off, so it's not that important, you can label it if you need to. Just fish this out of the way and then this one as well.

You can use some needle nose pliers and try to work it back and forth while you're pulling on it. Pull that one off and this one I'm gonna stick over here so I remember it goes over there. Stick that out of the way. There's an electrical connector right here that I'm gonna disconnect. Just take that, kinda push down on this lock right here and then disconnect that. You're grab this connector here and wiggle it back and forth. You should be able to pull it off, little tab right there. Set those wires out of your way.

We're gonna take these bolts out. There's four bolts that hold the compressor on. Right there and then two on the bottom. Take these four bolts out. It's a 14 millimeter. We're using a 14 millimeter socket and a ratchet. Loosen that one up, loosen this one up. You want to make sure you don't disconnect the hoses for the AC compressor because our system is still charged. If you disconnect those, you're gonna lose all your refrigerant and it is dangerous. Leave those connected, and then you won't have to charge the system after. I'll disconnect the two bottom ones. We can pull this compressor off. We're just gonna slide it out of the way. Just leave it right there.

I'm gonna take some cardboard and stick it in front of your radiator so that while you're working on the vehicle and you need to move stuff, that you won't damage the radiator, like that. Next we're gonna pull this bracket off. We have two 12 millimeter bolts that we gotta pull out. Loosen those up. Taking those off with a 12 millimeter socket and a ratchet. Pull that bolt out and we'll pull this bolt out and slide it out. If your stud stayed, then you'd slide this bracket off the stud and pull that out of the way. Before we pull the crank pulley off, I'm gonna pull the upper timing cover off. There's these eight millimeter bolts, taking these off with an eight millimeter socket and an extension and a ratchet. Sometimes they'll come off with the gasket seal, sometimes the seal will stay. Pull this last one off. You can pull that up. There's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, eight bolts. The reason I didn't take the crank off yet is cause we wanted to make sure these timing marks were lined up. This one needs to go up here. This one over here is gonna go up top there. We want those lined up before we take the crank off.

We're gonna take the crank bolt and use a socket, a one and 1/16th socket and a ratchet and we're gonna spin the engine clockwise. If you take the spark plugs out, this would be easier, but it's not necessary. It looks good right there. That dot's lined up with that dot. This one over here is lined up over here. Then down here, the crank is lined up right with the mark there. Now I'm gonna take a one and 1/16th socket and a pneumatic gun and we'll take this crank bolt out. I'm gonna hold the crank. I don't think it'll turn too much, but I have it on loosen. I was watching the timing mark and it's still in the exact place it was when I started. I know the crank didn't move, that's good. Pull that bolt out. Do the same on this side. Find a hole. Snug these up with a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. Snug this one up. They're not really gonna tighten up, they'll just keep going. So once you get a good bunch of turns going, you'll be all set. We're gonna tighten down the center of this puller. Okay. Now we're gonna take a 19 millimeter socket, stick it on the end of this puller. You're gonna hold the pulley while you're tightening this down. As you're tightening this down, the pulley is coming out. So make sure you hold on to the pulley because you don't want it to fall. There it is. Pull that up, just like that. There's a bolt here, one here, one down here below the crank, one here underneath all this mud, one here and one here and that's it.

These two bolts over here are a little bit longer. Take those out and pull the cover off. So before we take the belt off, there's the tension right there. I like to look and double check my timing marks to make sure they're lined up in the right spot. That one looks right. This one over here looks like it's in the right spot. Then down here to check this one, I'm gonna pull this little washer off. This comes off like this and then there's the mark right there. You can see that's lined up right there so that's good. I'm just gonna mark on the old timing belt where the timing marks are. We can compare it to the new timing belt and down here.

Okay, we're gonna take this tensioner off. We're gonna use a 14 millimeter socket and a ratchet. A little washer here, take the nut and the washer off. There's a couple washers. Take these washers off. Now be careful when you're pulling the tensioner out because there's a spring right here. I just popped it off and the tensioner will slide right out. There's the spring. Oh, as you can see this bearing is bad. That eventually would fail and cause the timing chain to jump and you'd have a lot of problems with that. Okay, now that that tensioner is loose, now we can take the belt off. Just be careful. Here we go.

Here's the old belt and tensioner. Here's the new belt and tensioner from 1aauto.com. As you can see, let's take a look at the tensioners first. The holes are machined the same. The bearing are good in the new one. The bearings are bad in the old one. It doesn't come with a spring but the spring is only for installation use only. So it doesn't really make a difference. We're just gonna transfer this over to the new one. This is our old belt. This is our new belt. The old belt has just marks. The new belt actually has marks, but they're actually labeled. Right cam, left cam and the crank. The marks line up with the old marks on the old belt. Get yours at 1aauto.com and you'll be ready to rock and roll.

Nissan recommends that you change these belts every 105,000 miles or 84 months, whichever comes first. All right, we're gonna transfer the spring from the old tensioner to the new one. Just lift up on the spring over here. Just pull this out a little bit, and it'll come right out. Put it on the same way, slide it down and now it's good just like that. Okay, there is a mark for the crank on here, but I'm gonna make a mark on the side on these two right there, so I know that the timing mark is right in between there cause I can't see it while I'm trying to put the belt on from the top.

All right, so we're gonna install the belt. As you can see this states the right side cam. The right side cam is actually the opposite of what you would think. The right side of the motor is where it would be if you were sitting in the vehicle. The right side is over here, the left side is on this side. So we'll line this up on the left side first. We're gonna line up the crank down below here. You can see those marks that I made and that's lined up right with that timing mark and that timing mark. Then you can look over here and it's close and right there, just like that. So that's lined up, this one's lined up and down below is lined up.

All right, so here's a tech tip, you can use some of these clamps or some like paper clips that open like that and you're gonna grab em. You can grab the cam and that will hold the timing belt there. You can grab it right here as well. That will keep your timing marks lined up while we're trying to install the tensioner. Yay. Down here on the crank, we want to keep the timing set. So we're gonna take a quarter inch extension and we're just gonna stick it right there. That'll keep the timing belt from popping off the crank.

Then we're gonna put the tensioner on. I'm gonna have this spring going this way towards the outside of the engine. I'm gonna start it right here. Get it on the shaft and then work the belt around it. I'm gonna use a short pick, like a hook style pick. I'm gonna try to get the spring pulled through. Okay. Now I can grab it with my fingers and slip it over the stud and then push the tensioner in. Okay. Just like that. So you get that part of the spring over that stud and the tensioner's on there properly. I can put my washer's on. I'm gonna put my nut on.

My nuts on, it's just finger tight, not too tight. I just want to rotate this back and forth, make sure it's centered pretty good. I can do is, stick my Allen in right here. Keeping note where it is, where your Allen goes. Right here. You can actually make a mark. All right, before I make a mark on this, just double check your timing marks. That one looks good. This one is lined up and this one's lined up over here. I will take these clamps off. Take this extension out and now I'm gonna make the mark and then I'm gonna torque this nut. Okay, I'll just take a marker and mark where this is. That's about where that Allen is.

Now I'm gonna torque this nut. I'm gonna use a 14 millimeter socket and this torque wrench. We sell these torque wrenches at 1aauto.com. I'm gonna torque this to 37 foot pounds. While I'm torquing this, I'm gonna hold the Allen in the position that it's in so that it doesn't move. It should be good. Okay, now we want to make sure that the belt is tight enough and not too loose. We want to check the deflection of the belt. We're gonna check it right here. What we're gonna do is take a straight edge, stick it in between the two cams and a ruler and you want to put about 22 pounds of force on the belt and that will tell you. You want it to be about half an inch of deflection and this looks like it's exactly where it's supposed to be.

If that wasn't right, what you would do is turn the crank and then loosen up your tensioner, readjust and then try it again. Okay, so before I put the covers on, I just want to turn the motor over and make sure everything is working properly. If you go to turn this and something binds up and it's really tight, your timing might not be right. So what I did was put the crank bolt back in, then I'm using my one and 1/16th socket. I'm just gonna turn the motor. There should be a little bit of tension which is fine. If it locks, that's not good. It seems like it's moving properly.

I did one full rotation, you don't necessarily have to do a full rotation but I did it just to make sure. This timing mark will line up here. This timing mark lines up with the case. Then this timing mark over here lines up with the case too. These timing marks will never line up again with these, well it would take like maybe 80 cycles so don't worry if those don't line up to the belt. Just make sure they line up to the case and the motor. Case would be the back of the timing cover. So we know we're good there. I'm just gonna double check my deflection to make sure that's good. A straight edge there. About 20 pounds of force and I got about half an inch which is good.

All right, so I'm gonna take the crank bolt off that I did. I have to use an impact. If you have a way that you can stop the motor from turning, you can get it with a ratchet, but I don't have any way to stop the motor from turning. I'm just gonna do it quick so that the motor doesn't turn and I don't lose timing or anything. That was quick. The motor didn't even turn when I was doing it. All right, before we put the timing cover on, this is very important. You need to put this washer on. This goes right here. That will actually keep the belt from slipping off. Right there. Then when we go to put this lower cover on, this gasket looks okay on ours, this just keeps the dust out and stuff, but if this gasket is messed up, you can use some silicone and reseal it. Just make sure you don't put too much. You don't want to get it on the belt.

Stick this back on. Line it up. You have these two longer bolts that go on this side. The longest bolt goes right here, through there and then this second long bolt goes through here. Then the rest of the bolts are just the regular ones. Put these bolts back in the cover. Put the bottom on in. All right, all right. Now, we're gonna torque these bolts down. We're gonna use an eight millimeter socket and an inch pound torque wrench. We're gonna torque these to 40 inch pounds. Make sure you're on inch pounds, not foot pounds. Good.

Before we put the crank pulley back on. We're gonna take these bolts out, we're gonna take this puller off. These are 10 millimeter bolts. Yours may be different depending on your type of puller. While you have your crank pulley out, you want to check this rubber ring around here cause this is actually, the pulley part is actually separate from this hub part and sometimes that will rot away and this will just free spin. So you want to check that. If it's bad, you're gonna want to replace it.

Okay, so we're gonna install this crank pulley. Just line this up right here, push it on. Okay. It's recommended that you replace this bolt when you take it out but we're gonna reuse ours. You're gonna want to torque this to 150 foot-pounds. I don't have a way of stopping the engine, so I'm just going to use a pneumatic gun to get it on. Now we're gonna put the upper cover on. Again, if this silicone on the back side is peeling, you can add some. Just take it off, but ours looks pretty good. I'm just gonna wipe down the inside of this. I washed it off earlier, so a little bit of water in there. Wipe that down. Looks good.

All right, so now we're gonna install the upper cover. Get this lined up. All right, some of these rubber grommets stayed with the cover so the bolts that don't have the grommets on, you're gonna slide those in those locations. Screw that right in there. Then this one will go back here. There's another one over here. Now we're gonna torque these eight millimeter bolts down, an eight millimeter socket and a torque wrench. Make sure you're using an inch pounds torque wrench and it's 40 inch pounds for these bolts. Just go around like this.

All right, now we're gonna put our compressor back to where it should go. Pull these bungee cords off. It's gonna go in this location here. I'll install these AC compressor bolts. Get them started. Go around the steering shaft. Get the bottom ones in. So we'll tighten these bolts up with a 14 millimeter socket and a ratchet. We'll just snug these up. Snug up the bottom ones. That's good.

We're gonna install this bracket over here. Just put these bolts in loosely. Get those started. Then this brackets gonna go on top here like this. Put these two bolts in over here. Before I tighten those bolts down, I want to position this hose over here. We're gonna go through here, down here, get that hose at least in position. Now I can tighten these bolts down. This bolt is gonna go right here. Now I'll snug all these bolts down with a 12 millimeter socket and a ratchet. This one's a nut. Our stud came out with our nut. If your stud stays in the vehicle, then you would just need to put the nut there. Snug these two down. We're good.

Now we're gonna install this upper cross over hose that goes to the two valve covers. We're gonna take our channel lock pliers, squeeze the clamp and just get it lined up. Push down on the hose, just like that. I'm gonna do the same over here. Squeeze the pliers. Push down on the hose. Just like that. Install our 10 millimeter bolts right here and right here. All right. Then we'll tighten these down with a ratchet. Tighten this one down as well, just snug. We have a connector down here that we have to reach down and grab, connect that right there. Then this wire's gonna go into this slot right here. Right like that.

Now we can grab our wiring harness over here. Then gonna position this clip right here like that. This clip is gonna go right here like that. This connector's gonna go right here, slide on there. That goes to the distributor. This connector can plug into the distributor. Click that into place. This gray connector's gonna go right here. Is the connector broken? Oh, this green thing's stuck. Oh, it pops down like that. This green connector's gonna connect right here to the purge solenoid. This connector's gonna go right here on the throttle body. This gray one's gonna go on top. So it clicks in. Next we'll plug this gray connector in right here. Let's see. This is gonna line up like this. Just like that. This gray one goes to this line right here. Go under the compressor line, plug this in right here like that. Right here, you don't want to forget this. This is our temp sensor. Plug that in. Can you see it right there?

Okay. Plug that in right there. Then this is gonna go to our mass air flow sensor when we put our air box back in. Now we're gonna put these vacuum lines on. Remember this one goes to this back one over here. This top one. Slide that on, then we'll lock this in right here. Then this one is gonna go to this purge valve right there. Slide that on like that and we'll slide this in the clip. Just like that. Okay.

So we're gonna put the power steering pump belt on. Normally you have the coolant fan on here. We have the fan off at this time to make it easier to see. We're gonna wrap this belt around the crank, on the back side of the crank pulley, it's where the B channel goes. Then over here onto the power steering pump. We'll start it at the top and then we'll try to rotate it down just like that. We're gonna tighten up the adjuster screw right here. It's a 12 millimeter, I'm using a 12 millimeter socket with a ratchet. I'm just gonna tighten this to get more tension on the belt.

Pull this cardboard out. Slide this radiator down. There's two little mounts that you want the grommets to fit right into. Get those lined up. You'll take this upper radiator support. This is gonna go on like this and this one like this. Just go like that. These two nuts will go on top, just like that. Take a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. We'll tighten these down. Tighten this one down. All right. All right.

We're gonna take our plug out of our transmission cooler line hose. Pull that out and then press that on here. We'll do the same with this side. Like that and push that on. We'll move the clamps. Just use regular pliers for this. That'll be good. Same with this one. Right there. That's good. You can use a little bit of brake parts cleaner to clean that up. We're gonna install this lower radiator hose. Get this lined up here. I'm gonna install this lower part of the radiator hose. We'll take our channel lock pliers, move this hose clamp. There's a little marking on the radiator hose right here that shows that goes to the bottom. That's gonna go like that.

We can reinstall this hose. I'm gonna turn this, yeah, all right. I'm gonna reinstall this hose. Stick this here. You can tighten that hose clamp down. Use a 10 millimeter socket, extension and a ratchet. We'll tighten this hose clamp down. All right. Clamp that down so it's snug. Install this bolt here. Install this bolt here. It's a 12 millimeter bolt, we'll tighten it down with a 12 millimeter socket and extension. Okay.

I'm gonna install the fan next. I'm using the ratchet wrench to tighten these nuts down. You're not gonna be able to get a torque wrench in here. So just do the best you can. Once we put the belts on, you can snug em up a little bit more. Next we'll take our drive belt, pull the tape off that we labeled it with. Now when you're putting this on, you'll still have your radiator shroud here. You can sneak it past there. I'm gonna go around the fan just like so. You're gonna have the belt started to crank. It's gonna come up to the water pump. It's gonna go back here on the alternator. Once it's around all three of those pulleys, then you can put it under our tensioner pulley.

Now we're gonna tighten up the tensioner pulley right here. We'll take a 12 millimeter socket and extension and a ratchet and we'll tighten up this tensioner pulley. Right here, when we push down on it, we're looking for about a quarter inch of deflection. That's probably about good there. If you find that the belts squeal, you may want to tighten it up a little bit more. You may have to tighten it if they stretch a little bit. Now we'll tighten this bolt up for the tensioner. Lock that down. That's pretty good and tight.

Now we'll take our AC belt that we labeled. Pull the tape off. We'll slip it over the fan. It's going to go around the crank down below. It's gonna come up around and on the compressor. Then up and over the tensioner. Oops, it slipped off the crank. Just like that. Now I'm gonna tighten the tensioner right her. For this adjuster, I'm gonna need a 14 millimeter socket and an extension and a ratchet and tighten this up. Make sure it's around your pulleys and all the grooves. The same here. We're looking for about a quarter inch of deflection, so we'll tighten this a little more. That's about good. Maybe about one more turn. All right.

Now we'll tighten this nut down. Now that's snug. Now if any of these end up squealing or loosen up in a couple days of driving, then just snug em up a little bit more. After you install the belts, you're gonna want to tighten these nuts up for the fan. Get in there with your 10 millimeter wrench and make sure those are snug.

Now we're gonna put our radiator fan shroud on. You slide this over. It's a little bit tight over here. I'm just gonna snug it under here. Just like that. There's some pins, it lines up down here. Then the same on the other side. Make sure that's in, then we'll put the two bolts in. Take this bolt right here and this one right here. We'll tighten these two up with a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. Same with this one. Put this one on, the upper radiator hose. Get this clamp lined up. Use a 10 millimeter ratchet and tighten this down. Make sure that's snug.

Pull this throttle cable down. Click that in place and then this goes in over here. Like that. Take the air filter, stick the air filter back in. I'll take the air box. It's gonna slide in under here. There we go. Click that in there. Click this in here. Click this right here. Click this one right here. Click this that was on here. There's another coolant hose. This goes to your overflow. This gets clicked in over here. Here. Pushed on there.

Then this is gonna go right here. Connect that snorkel to the throttle body and these two little breather holes, breather hoses. I'm gonna grab my pliers, squeeze this and I can put that on there. Then this one can go on here. Move this clamp with my channel lock pliers. Push that on. I'll take this, I'll tighten that up right here. I'll tighten this up, this one clamp up with an eight millimeter socket and a ratchet and extension. Make sure it's all the way down. Looks good. Snug that up.

This goes underneath this clip. Just like that. This wire right here goes over to here. If this clip wasn't broken it would secure right there and then this plugs into the mass air flow sensor, there like that. Now we're gonna put this lower fan shroud on. Get this lined up here. Get the top part lined up. That'll clip in. This will clip in and then this one should clip in. There it goes. It's locked in. Make sure that tab's in there. It's good.

Put this lower shield back up. This shield does not have all the bolts, so you may have more than what we have here. May have bolts there, there and there. This one does not have those bolts. Oops, this one here. Good.

We're gonna connect the negative post to the battery. Tighten it up with a 10 millimeter wrench. Okay. Now we're gonna want to add our coolant. You can use a funnel and add your 50/50 mix of coolant in there. We're gonna fill it up, then bleed it. Whenever you replace any internal engine components or you're draining the coolant for any reason, you're gonna want to add your coolant here into the radiator. You can not add the coolant just in the reservoir because the engine will not get any of the coolant, so add it to the reservoir. If you're checking your engine coolant on a regular basis, you can just check the reservoir and top that off.

Now we're gonna add our 50/50 mix of coolant and water. As we're adding this, it's a good idea to look underneath the vehicle and check and see if there's anything leaking out. Ours looks good. Okay, so there is some air in the system still even though we have this coolant all the way filled. The radiator's full of coolant, the engine still has some air pockets in it. What we're gonna do is we're gonna start the vehicle and let the engine run for about 10 minutes. All right, so we let the vehicle run for about 10 minutes. As you can see the coolant temperature, we want to keep monitoring it while we're letting it run. We want it about half way in between the cold and the hot. This vehicle doesn't have temperature readings. You just have to use your best judgment. If you start seeing it go up to about three quarters above, not in the halfway mark, you're gonna want to stop, shut the vehicle off, let the vehicle cool down and the rebleed it, recheck your levels and start over.

All right, so we let the engine run for about 10 minutes and the engine got up to operating temperature and the thermostat opened and all the air bleeded out of the engine and came out our funnel and everything's all bled, everything's good. At this point, what I'm gonna do is with this funnel, stick this plug in here, then I can pull the funnel up and make sure the level is right up to the top of the radiator. With the engine still hot, I will put this radiator cap on. We will let the engine cool down. We are gonna want to check before we just let it cool down, the coolant reservoir and make sure the coolant reservoir has enough coolant in it. I like to go about an inch about the fill line when doing this procedure because it is gonna suck back in some more coolant and then you can adjust it once the engine is cool. So I'm gonna add this coolant to the reservoir.

If you don't have one of these funnels, that's okay. When you're bleeding the system, you can leave the radiator cap off while you're running the engine. You're just gonna have to monitor it closely so that you don't lose coolant. You're gonna have to stand here with your coolant bottle and keep adding coolant. If it starts coming out, then shut the engine off and start the bleed procedure again.

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1997 - 2000  Infiniti  QX4
1999 - 2004  Nissan  Frontier
1996 - 2000  Nissan  Pathfinder
2000 - 2004  Nissan  Xterra
1994 - 1995  Nissan  Pathfinder
1999 - 2002  Nissan  Quest
1996 - 1998  Nissan  Quest
1994 - 1998  Nissan  Quest
1994 - 1996  Mercury  Villager
1997 - 1998  Mercury  Villager
1999 - 2002  Mercury  Villager
2001 - 2004  Nissan  Frontier
2002 - 2004  Nissan  Xterra
1994 - 1994  Nissan  D21 Hardbody Pickup
1995 - 1995  Nissan  Pickup
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