Still investigating whether I want to even attempt this one myself. Got a Melling M208 low pressure pump and Fluidampr crank pulley sitting in boxes. I know Toyota makes an “SST” to get their crankshaft pulley bolts on and off the right way, and many of theirs call for 240-240 ft/lbs so no joke there compared to the 212 on the 7.3 engine

Lots of forum guys say if it’s a manual trans just put it in 5th or 6th and chock the tires. Is this how a shop would do it, or is that going to damage gears or bearings in the transmission doing that? never been able to find a definitive answer on that. Automatic trans, remove the inspection cover and chock a flex plate tooth with something sturdy…big screw driver or crow bar. Could do that with the flywheel on a manual too by removing the starter, but who wants to do that. Impact gun…heard that’s also a bad idea and requires removal of the rad. (Again who wants to do that). Probably still a 2 person job but a proper holding tool would make this a little less dicey.

 

When I did mine, I just stuck a pry bar into the 'spokes' and wedged it against the frame. Took a bit of fiddling to get the length/angle right.

 

similar concept I guess. Fluidampr doesn’t have holes though so don’t think that will work on re-install.

You just use a breaker bar and socket to back the bolt out?

 

Yeah, breaker bar, socket. and a prybar wedged against the frame to get it loose as well.

What was more of a pain was the puller/installer. The threads are fairly recessed into the crank, and couldn't use the standard ones I had. Ended up getting the mattox? branded one at HF. Was a disk shape, and several crank thread adapters.

 

this is what I did

Puller at oreillys worked for me, surprisingly after seeing many reviews it would be too short. Maybe theres 2 PNs.

 

I have 3 of them and all 3 were about 1/4" too short to get square with the bolts.

 

So re-install (of the bolt) was basically opposite of the uninstall except using a torque wrench instead of a breaker bar? And this was re-installing an OEM pulley/balancer where the pry bar could be used as a holding tool I assume?

the puller/installer tool is the other gotcha. Old one has to be pulled off at minimum. I don’t like the idea of pressing it back on by threading the bolt back in either…that’s asking for trouble if the bolt were to break off or gall up the threads in the crankshaft…you’d have a grade A mess at that point. I’m sure plenty of people have done it that way though.

 

A good puller/installer kit is also an installer for that reason. Thread the insert into the crank and that is used to draw down the balancer. I don't believe in this case you could even pull it down w/ the bolt if you try. The threads are so recessed into the crank that you'd not be able to even hit them.

As for a pulley holder, I suppose you could make a tool that threaded into a couple of the pulley bolts w/ a long enough handle for leverage...

 

Used 5th gear to remove the bolt
Puller worked fine for me as a puller
To install it, I used a longer bolt (took old to store to match it up) then used OEM bolt to do the rest
used 5th gear to tighten it after moving wheel chocks to other side......

 

having a manual transmission myself I’d be perfectly happy to do it that way if I knew there wasn’t any risk of damaging anything by torquing on the crankshaft that hard with the vehicle stationary. (Theoretically something would break at some point but don’t know if 212 ft/lbs is even close to doing that). Maybe it’s a perfectly fine trick for a manual trans.

it wasn’t that hard to drive it back on with a longer hardware store bolt? I saw a YouTube vid of a guy doing it that way though and it seemed to work fine and didn’t start turning the motor until the pulley bottomed out and the bolt snugged up, so it must not have been needing a ton of effort to turn the bolt against the threads. The idea just makes me leery though. Pretty sure he put a light coating of oil on everything first to make it slide on easier.

 

And they actually make these for not too unreasonable a price for other types of engines…same idea as the Toyota “Special Service Tool”



Just was curious if anybody had come across one that worked for a 7.3 engine. Particularly with that darn fluid dampener there’s nowhere to jam a crowbar.

I know the stock bolt is too short for the “bolt-press-on” trick to work with the Fluidampr. It requires a slightly longer bolt from the hardware store as knottyrope said. With the OEM balancer it might though. I’d prefer to use the installer tool personally.

 

OEM HB needed the longer bolt also. I went through two of them Dorman brand at autozone that failed in two days from delaminating before going Fluidampr.

 

My 1995 7.3 makes 525 ft/lbs stock

 

these are the PNs when I rented the tools back in Feb and they had long enough bolts for me. YMMV it appears.