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First post here but I have been loving this board for a few weeks now. I have a 97 Brighton that has always run wonderfully, temp. gauge never budged, ever, idles so quietly that I have forgot once at work and left it on. Super reliable car and of course I do very regular maintenence. My problem is that a few weeks ago I started it in the garage and its normaly quiet idle quickly developed a squeaking almost scraping sound that got worse for about 20 seconds and then, for the first time ever, the motor kind of gently just chugged to a stop. Of course this sounds a lot like a timing belt issue except that the car did the same exact thing, made the same alarming noise once about a week before this but the first time I jumped in and gave it a little gas and when the RPMs died down it smoothed out. It did not do this again until a week later when the car died. Now the car cranks like crazy but just wont catch and start. I've checked the following. It is getting gas past the fuel filter. It is getting spark. I pulled out the cranck position and camshaft sensorand cleaned them both up, they were pretty filthy. I did pop in new plugs and wires just in case (the old plugs looked pretty bad.). I removed one side of the timing belt cover (passenger side) and the belt seems tight and actually looks pretty new. I really do not know when any of this stuff was done on this car. I bought this car with 234,000 on it and currently it has 280,000 so I know it is is up there but it ran so well and at one point was my families only ride and we grew to love the car ( Its OK, laugh, I know it sounds silly ) that I would really like to keep it going. If I can get it running we would become a two Subaru family. we cant really afford a second car right now but I could spend a little on this.The motor sure did not run, up to this point, like it was tired or long in the tooth. Is it possible that it could be anything other than the timing belt ? Would it be worth the $200.00 plus for me to throw in a new timing belt kit just to find out if that is it and/or are my vaves smashed. Are the valves automatically toast even if it fails at idle ?? Insight from more experienced minds would be much appreciated.