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[Raeturbo]

Wow this is a long thread about an Astra , think I would have moved it on & bought something else.

                You may have, James will not, he does not give up, and enjoys the challenge👍

[JamesV6CDX]

I think was responsible for some of the noise 



Two of the bolts have sheared off inside the sprocket. I'm hoping I can remove them without having to remove the cambelt and sprocket, the centre bolt looks like it's 10000000000 nm tight!

On a serious note, I'm genuinely, sure I torqued the crank pulley bolts up. I remember having the ratchet on them.

I've ordered a new pulley for tomorrow, so hopefully I'll get this sorted without too much ado

[Doctor Gollum]

At least the cam belt doesn't go around that

[dave the builder]

The crankshaft pulley is a harmonic damper ,takes a beating on a diesel
center bolt on the petrol ones are stretch/one use and need replacing
obviously yours is diesel but I imagine they are similar torque values
with the crankshaft locked ,I always manage to crack them loose (Brute force and ignorance )

[JamesV6CDX]

At least the cam belt doesn't go around that

Indeed. Lucky escape all round, imagine bending a valve and having to take all that apart again 

I'll get those threads extracted, and fit a new pulley tomorrow, hopefully. Will new steel bolts, and some thread lock !!!

[JamesV6CDX]

Jokes aside, I breathed a big sigh of relief, when I found that. The pulley was visibly rattling around, and was a clear source of a lot of the noise I've been experiencing, and all in all is not a terrible job to do.

Now the coding / ECU / Fuelling etc also seems happy, I am hopeful that all it's going to take, is a new pulley, for a very happy car 

[dave the builder]

Just the clutch on the alternator now then       

[JamesV6CDX]

Just the clutch on the alternator now then       

Shhhhhhhhhhhhh!! All in good time!!!!

[JamesV6CDX]

Worked out what I had done wrong, today.

I have been beating myself up, thinking, I just must, have tightened the crank pulley bolts. I double and triple check stuff like that. And I remember doing it.

But.

I fitted the wrong length bolts    They were marginly too long, which meant they tightened in the holes, without fully clamping the pulley against the sprocket

Thus - it wiggled around, cut itself through the bolts, and elongated the bolt holes, as seen here:



It also broke off half the existing bolts flush with the sprocket.

So, no problem thought I. I'll just get a new crank pulley and sprocket, no harm done.

Then I dug out the drills and the taps.

Started by taking the cambelt back off, so engine back off it's mount, and also bottom sprocket bolt successfully removed:




Made, and threaded, some more M8 x 1.25 holes in the crank sprocket. Not a work of art, I don't even have a vice or bench here, and had to do it with a hand-held drill - but, very functional.



I attached the pulley to the sprocket first, and drilled through the pulley to make some new corresponding holes in that also.

Then, using thread lock, I've tightened some M8 threads into the sprocket as far as they will safely go, with enough protuding for the crank pulley to slot over. I will then fit nylock nuts over the ends and torque back up, doing it that way, I get the maximum purchase for each hole.



There are in total, seven fasteners holding this on now. It won't go anywhere, fast.

Who said make do and mend culture was dead? 

I probably will fit a new sprocket and pulley for once I know the car's running right, but I'm not shelling out into the hundreds on a project car until it's proven.

I'll get the belt back on and the engine back together once more tomorrow

[YZ250]

Worked out what I had done wrong, today.
.......
Who said make do and mend culture was dead? 
.........
I probably will fit a new sprocket and pulley for once I know the car's running right, but I'm not shelling out into the hundreds on a project car until it's proven.

I'll get the belt back on and the engine back together once more tomorrow

Nice job, and as you say, silly to throw more money at it until you know it's fully sorted.    I don't like things beating me either. How annoying would that have been for you to have moved it on, only for the new owner to say "Ere, guess what, that rattling noise was just the pulley bolts bottoming out". You'd be well pissed wouldn't you, so fair play for sticking with it. 
Fingers crossed for the next test run. 

[Doctor Gollum]

Thinking this through, shouldn't those bolts have had washers? Were they not the original ones?

Kind of the same question from opposite ends, but you'll not want to going through all the palaver just to repeat it

[dave the builder]

I put the bolts back in their holes  and keep assemblies/parts and their fixings separate  to each other for this reason.

your getting there now 

[Doctor Gollum]

I put the bolts back in their holes  and keep assemblies/parts and their fixings separate  to each other for this reason.

your getting there now 

I sort of do especially if you've ten bolts of different lengths like gearbox to engine...

[JamesV6CDX]

I put the bolts back in their holes  and keep assemblies/parts and their fixings separate  to each other for this reason.

your getting there now 

I'll take that on the chin, admittedly I should have been a bit more organised with labelling stuff on a strange engine, etc, but life goes on, and all that ends well, etc.

So today I finished my crank pulley bodge repair, got the cambelt all setup and installed, along with the aux belt and engine mount.

Sounds like a different car. So, so much quieter.

Went out for a brief run, and despite the garage being successful in doing the injector small adjustments, and that fault code now gone, it was still massively over fuelling. You could hear the difference in engine tone, and it stank (although wasn't particularly smokey).

Computer was reading 28mpg.

Not sure what made me do this, but I then decided rather than using the hand held rubbish, I would check the codes with my special chinese tool. It showed a MAF code, which the hand held didn't show. Then it twigged, I think I ran it briefly without the MAF when trying to look closer at the crank pulley.

So, a code reset with the special tool and the laptop, reset the trip computer, and tried again.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh that's better. A much nicer, quieter, smoother engine note - and an average of 55mpg

Next job is to order and fit a a complete new exhaust system, and then I'm just going to run her for 500 miles and see how she behaves going forward. If all is well after say 1,000 miles, it will be a new cambelt kit, aux belt, another oil and filter, and hopefully I'll have some faithful service from her

[dave the builder]

Well done 
it's a nice feeling when you sort all the problems and niggles and have a car behave 

the Chinese reader does seem to find all the codes etc ,unlike generic code readers