Car: 2001 Honda Civic EX Coupe

Alittle backstory; I bought my car at auction up in NY and drove it from NY to FL. Car has 91k miles on it and did alot of maintenance work prior to that drive. Well, when I got it down to Florida, I haven't had much time/money to put it on the road so it has been sitting for 3 years. I honestly don't know the maintenance history on the car and the carfax hasn't revealed anything either.

Well, I have been preparing my vehicle for a few weeks in order to drive it up to NC. The car was having some troubles power wise so I had to put another alternator in it. While replacing the alternator, I noticed that the lower timing belt cover was rubbing against the harmonic balancer and bored a hole in it(2 bolts broke the plastic on cover, might be from previous owner over-tightening). So here I am currently, with the harmonic balancer off and am about to replace the lower timing belt cover and I notice the crankshaft is leaking alittle oil. So that is where my question is relevant.

Coming up on a 700 mile drive after the car has been sitting for 3 years, should I be worried about replacing the timing belt, etc or no? The car never had any problems from the time I have driven it and the only issues I have had with it were problems with the alternator. Are there any other things I should check on the vehicle to make sure it can make that trip?

Any help would be greatly appreciated and I apologize in advance for the story.

 

You are at or near the service interval for a timing belt replacement... so go ahead and replace it along with the crank main seal that is leaking a little as you stated, the cam seal, tensioner, and the water pump. Then you won't have to worry about these regular maintenance issues for another 90 to 100K miles.

 

You already got the crank pulled off too? With that being said, I’d replace the belt even if I didn’t have to. Just make sure you get a OEM or gates belt.

 

Definitely replace the timing belt, and you should also repair the oil leak. It is now 17 years after the car was manufactured. Timing belts don't last nearly that long. It was probably never replaced because 91k is just 14k under the recommended replacement interval. Your car has an interference engine, meaning it will be a much more expensive repair if the timing belt breaks then if you replace it now.