Ok so back to the car here... At MOTD the Rat-MINI decided it had an appetite for S/C belts. Our original diagnosis was a misaligned S/C pulley, so not much that I could do at the Dragon... I replaced the belt with the help of Helix and friends outside the Helix tent on vendor row, and on the way home it ate another rib off the new belt. The way the remaining 5 ribs of a belt looked on the pulleys, to me didn't add up if it was a S/C pulley problem, so I investigated it a bit further. Sure enough, running on stands with the passenger front wheel and liner removed showed the problem. The OE (2004) crank pulley was flopping around like a fish! Lucky for me I had an ATI pulley ready to install from my original motor, so it was a free fix. Anyhow, the crank bolt calls for 85 Ftlbs of torque, and normally (every one of them I have changed anyhow) they are STUCK on bad... Not this one though! It popped right out using a standard 3/8 drive ratchet! Then is when the problems started... I go to attach my puller to the pulley, and two of the bolts threaded into the jack holes, but the third hole had no threads! My thought was to weld a nut over the hole, put the bolt in and yank that POS off... So out came the welder. I got the nut tacked into place, threaded the bolt in, and a quarter of a turn on the puller later I was back to square one! The welds just popped right off the pulley, so I gave it another shot, and put some heat on it this time... Again as soon as I applied pressure to the puller the welds broke off of the pulley! So back to the drawing board! I thought about it over a long night out with some friends, then thought about it some more the next morning... Then it hit me. I have a bunch of flappy arm 3 prong pullers in different sizes, but there is little to no room between the pulley, and the oil pump housing, so I found some arms that I could squeeze behind the pulley, but they were for a 3" puller. Time to start piecing together tools to make a puller that would work... So I took the arms off the 3" puller, then the links off of a 6" puller, and the center hub and bolt from a 4", and it all fit! Slowly the pulley started coming off, with the help of a lot of oil and some heat, then all at once was the thud I was hoping for! FrankenPuller worked! Granted that POS pulley is borked pretty bad, but who cares it came off, and the ATI was replacing it. Finally Monday morning, the ATI pulley went on without issue. Bolt torqued down to 85ftlbs, and a new belt... Fired it up and steady as a rock, and a lot smoother of a feel inside the car... Boom, DONE! Test drive around the block... Well one thing lead to another, and "around the block" just wasn't good enough! So I headed for the sticks... 200 Miles and a little over half a tank of 91 Colorado crap gas later I returned home with a complete belt, over a full hole showing on the tensioner, and a big unexplainable grin on my face... Still keeping an eye on everything though, but at this point I drive the Rat about as much as Dave.0 drives in general... So maybe once a week to a month.
Good to hear you got it all sorted out. Nothing worse than having a simple repair fight you tooth and nail.
I also need to send out a special thanks to Chris (Rally MINI), Jeff (WMWNY), and Teddy (GoldSmithy) for their support in my quest for a full sticker headliner! Jeff earned the sweet spot with one he sent, it is partially covered in this pic due to forum rules, but you can guess what one is going right above the rear view "rollbar view" mirror. I appreciate the donations, and wont turn anybody's stickers down as long as they are PG-13 or under for subject content... Language is ok, but I dont think I would use a bag full of "my name" stickers! I am going to be attending car shows with kids present.
sorry for the deviation of the thread with those CR rat cars. LOL Looks like a nice selection of stickers. I'll look for some more when I'm back in the US. The store near me has 1400 different beers!
Knocking a few back, and hoping to catch the next door neighbor that thinks it is OK to go out an rev his bike up at 2AM... Local friends are invited. Country Justice will be served... Most of the time this works... You just have to go about it the right way. If not, I will be in Detox for the weekend... With my friends as company... Hope to talk to yall tomorrow.
You should have brought home a 120 belt or 400 belt of firecrackers and tossed them at him as walks out to start his bike at 2 AM. That will make him Shard himself. :lol:
Well after the third time of jumping it up on the launch control for 10 feet then hitting the 7200 RPM REV Limit, he came running out in his boxer shorts and said "Really"... Then I explained to him that starting his bike up at 2AM, plus having every other car he owns has a loud exhaust, kinda piss'es his neighbors off. I also told him that he complains how loud my car is when I start it a few times a week, yet they rev theirs up in the driveway every effin day, that it was only a matter of time before it caught up to him. (Note to people, if you have a loud exhaust, dont even start the thing while it will disturb those around you) Surprisingly the cops didnt show up this time, but they will the next time he decides to wake us up in the middle of the night.
good thing you I don't live next door to you! but then again if I'm revving up my Mini I won't be bothered if you do. LOL I did wonder when I go to work at 7:45 what the other folks around think to vroom vroom clank clank as I leave
Very nice set of pictures, I have seen some excellent pictures coming out of the photo shoot yesterday. Post up the classic shot with the tommy-gun, it is worth a commentary here or over in the gun thread. Looks good. Don