Time to change my thermostat
 

Hey guys, back again (it's like an ongoing quest for me :D).

So, bought a new thermostat for my 95 a6 with the 2.8L V6.

I just wanted to make sure that the thermostat in these cars can be done without removing the timing belt? I really don't want to have to worry about keeping everything lined up (of course I'll make sure everything is... but still).

It can be done simply by loosening it by moving the tensioner to it's "loose" state... correct? I couldn't think of any better way to say that...:D

I'm hoping to tackle this this weekend, as I have the parts (had to order the freaking "gasket" for the t-stat, I mean really, who has the thermostat itself but not the o-ring that goes with it...), and I don't see why I wouldn't do it.

Anything else I should know about. I've simply never worked on this specific engine before. Anything I should replace etc etc?

If you do more searches, you can come across a post where someone describes how he did it by using lots of tie-wraps ...not sure exactly how it works, since I don't remember particulars from that post and I'm too lazy to search right now.
I would assume you can crank it up (by hand) to TDC and then tie-wrap the belt on the driver bank's cam sprocket. Then you can probably loosen it on the other side. It would have been much easier with the locking tools, though.

Well, it can be done by just loosening the timing belt. The belt doesn't need to be bent uh... up or down (from the flat faces), but rather sideways as to make room for the thermostat housing to move out from the engine. I just made sure to mark the belt and cam sprockets (is that what they're called?) and I only loosened it enough for me to do it. I don't even think it was loose enough to skip a tooth if it wanted to.

I can't tell you if anything worked yet cause I thought we had antifreeze, but I was wrong. I'm gunna get some tomorrow morning. (Along with the two oil filters that autozone ordered wrong TWICE!)

Over all, it was pretty easy. It's really the first time I've ever done anything without my brother around, so hopefully I will be able to say that I'm proud of myself tomorrow morning. After I figure out how to bleed the cooling system that is. I think I'm going to go for the "pour a bunch in and let it sit there for a couple hours then pour some more in" approach:D.

Oh, and it would have been a 100 times easier if I had to tools to remove the timing belt. Good news is it looks like my timing belt was replaced sometime recently.