[Jay In Milpitas]

Originally Posted by Juanro

This happened recently to a fellow RX3 rider here in Argentina and it triggered a mild paranoia about plastic gears.

Thank you for sharing that, Juanro. I see some interesting wear on the bottom gear also.

It brings up many questions. Had other work been done on the engine before? How often was the oil and filter changed? What kind of oil? Etc.

For many years most American V8 car engines used plastic teeth on the camshaft timing chain and those would last more than 60,000 miles before needing replacement. I suspect this engine had something else going wrong that started the problem.