Im deep into the timing belt front seal replacement and the bearing on the fan bracket is noisy. Best place for a replacement plz. I trashes the bracket trying to press the bearing/shaft out

also, cant get the timing pulley off the crank:) drill and tap time:)Im very disappointed on this 3.0 for ease of maint.

PM me plz

Ordered from dealer the fan bracket. Cheaper than each idler pulley for serp. belt. Go figure....

Now to buy the pneumatic angle drill and play
"safe cracker" trying to drill and tap the timing pulley:(

I just read this and was going to offer you mine since I just replaced it with a new one so all pulley bearings would be new. As you found out, the OE price is cheap for such a large aluminum casting with bearings and shaft.

Frank

You just hit one of the few snags in working on a 3.0. No easy way to pull the crank pulley. I get most loose with a combination of Knok'r'Loose, PB Blaster, gentle prying (beware the oil seal lip on the oil pump!), and hammer shock blows to the loosened crank bolt. The timing belt crank sprocket is worse. I usually have to drill and split them off and buy new. Antiseize is your friend, in liberal quantities. Getting the pulley holes lined up to reinstall the front mounting bolts on the ps pump pulley is also often fun, especially since the pulley rotates a tad and they misalign as you pry the belt tight. I leave the socket on the outer bolt as I make the pry to hold alignment.

Check the timing belt timing several times, hand rotating the engine several revolutions. It is VERY easy to get off one tooth between cams and crank, since one crank tooth is only one half cam tooth distance, and the crank sprocket has a fat notch to match a skinny mark, AND the cam sprocket punches are over a belt width forward of the mating marks on the head side and have to be viewed dead on to accurately align the cams.

Yeah, exactly what fasteddy said. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/kewl.gif" alt="" /> On the crank sprocket, I ended up drilling 2 holes 180 apart & bottom-tapping them for 1/4-20 bolts, then used a puller to get it off once. Even then, it wasn't easy...and is NOT recommended to re-use the drilled sprocket.

I had to remove the crank sprocket to replace the seals & gaskets when replacing my engine (replacement engine was from a 94 3000GT). Odd thing was, with the 3000GT engine, the crank sprocket slid off by hand (undamaged, thank goodness).

I used to buy anti-seize by the blister-pack tube some time ago. NOW I buy it by the bottle, with the brush in the cap. And it has saved the day for me quite a few times already...sage advice. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Of course it was a bit easier with the engine out of the vehicle, ouch... <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/scared.gif" alt="" /> Good Luck.

Sounds like Ill be having fun next later this week. Got a couple days off from the shop to go fly to MEX City.

Just how to I tell if the crank pulley bolt is the new and improved one?? from looking at the head and piston work done on this car and timing belt I am inclined to think that nothing else was replaced when it was apart. Like tension idler/spring, front seat, water pump etc etc. Itll be right when Im done with it for my own piece of mind.

scott

Old style bad crank bolt has a shaft at the hex head that slightly larger than the hex itself. Good TSB bolt has a more normal head and shaft shape (shaft is about half hex witdth diameter) with an additional flange to press on the big bellville washer at the pulley.