The old Corollas in the 70s and 80s had timing chains. In the 90s, Honda, Toyota, and even Nissan started making belt-driven cranks instead of chains. Now they are back to timing chains. What happened?
In: Engineering
Chains are superior to belts in many ways (longevity, efficiency etc.) but early cam-chain engines lacked refinements like proper tensioning systems which led to high development costs and some catastrophic failures causing repetitional damage.
This led to a re-adoption of the well-known and tried-and-tested belt.
More recently, engine designers have re-embraced chains owing to better materials and tensioning systems making them cost effective and less likely to fail.
Belts are still chosen for some applications like race engines (where gear-driven cams are not present) because or their lightweight nature.
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