Harmonic Balancer came off while driving. Misfires solved!!!

[elislider]

when you reset the ecu, the first startup afterwards will probably sound differently than youre used to. for example, it might want to die, or rev higher or lower than it usually does, while it recalibrates everything. thats it though, give it 5 seconds and it should idle normally, and after driving it for 5 minutes it will be back to 100% normal operation

[harrymaneuvers]

Noted!

Well thank you for all who helped out with this one.

It has now been a full week of daily driving and everything is back to normal.

[JunkerXL]

hello, been lurkin, thought id join up and comment. i had a 93 impreza that had a similar problem. (the pulley falling off) the stupid woodruff key was mess up pretty bad from a bad previous repair. i bought the car that way, no biggie, but where i had trouble was not being able to get the old key out. it was REALLY in there. i bought a new pulley, but the key, predictably wore a groove in the new one (kinda had to see it to grasp it), so i filled the groove and the back side of the pulley with jb weld, and then put locktite on the bolt, and tightened it for the ages. it never gave me trouble again, and because jb weld is brittle i could get it off with a few "gentle" whacks of a rubber mallet, after the bolt was out. but anyway, since doing battlefield repairs is less than ideal, i gotta know, how did you get the key outa there? not that i plan on that happening again, but its good to know how.

[harrymaneuvers]

Well I decided that I was just going to do a timing belt/water pump job while I was in there... I took the fans and radiator out to give me extra room. The crank bolt was barely hand tight so the damaged crank pulley came off easily. The crank sprocket was more difficult however. Even though it had a tiny bit of rotational play, when I went to slide it off of the end of the crankshaft, it wouldnt budge. I ended up using a two jaw puller to get it off.



The key itself wasnt true anymore. The top of it (not the part that sits in the crankshaft keyway but the part that slides into the keyway in the crank sprocket and the crank pulley) had shifted to the right a little bit. Once the crank sprocket was off... the key literally fell off of the crankshaft because it was pointed down due to having the timing marks lined up. I had only been driving with it that way for maybe a two weeks. If you drove around with a jacked up key/keyway for an extended period of time before you fixed it with the JB weld... it might have been pounded in there really really good. That would be the only thing i can think of?!?! Putting the new key in, I had to hold it on the crankshaft while I slid the crank sprocket and crank pulley over it... So it isnt like it is hammered in or out of its keyway in the crankshaft.

[JunkerXL]

lol i'll remember that when i do my timing belt, i will watch for the key to be tweaked, my key was tweaked the exact same way. the jb weld thing was a shot in the dark, last resort, to get me back to the office until i could come up with a better solution, lol worked like a champ, with the lock tight and the severe tightening i gave it

[harrymaneuvers]

I was thinking about using an aluminum can to make super skinny shims to try to wedge into the gap between the key and the keyway... but loctite and extreme tightening has seemed to fix it... at least for the last 2k miles...

[Grafton]

the crank sprocket is ~23 at the dealer...
ask me how i know

[JunkerXL]

I was thinking about using an aluminum can to make super skinny shims to try to wedge into the gap between the key and the keyway... but loctite and extreme tightening has seemed to fix it... at least for the last 2k miles...

my kinda ghetto mechanix!
id fix it right though asap, since your car is actually worth fixing lol

[harrymaneuvers]

You guys are misunderstanding... I think.

There is a VERY VERY tiny gap between the key itself, and the keyway in the crankshaft... the only way to actually repair it would be to replace the crankshaft or drop a new engine in there. Or jb weld like the previous post mentioned.

The crank sproket (replaced) fits incredibally tight over the crankshaft and the key. I combined that with some loctite and a good torque on the crankshaft bolt... I havent had any issues.

[JunkerXL]

ahh less ghetto but more -breaks less- ftw!

[elislider]

yeah unfortunately if you wear out the keyway too much, the only way to fix it is with a new crank! though in cases like this I dont see too much problem with some jbweld or a tiny shim in there. its not like the crank pulley needs to be oriented at a precise degree of rotation or something, its not related to timing at all.

[1-3-2-4]

I think bits of rubber came off my HB I started getting misfires 1-4 on my car and the car just felt funny when I took it to 5500 rpms, about 20 seconds later I lost my belt for the alt & PS and when it was safe to pull over I saw the HB wobbling up and down.

What I don't get is if it's bolted how can it move up and down like that?

[harrymaneuvers]

When you say bolted down... do you mean tight?

The pulley fits over the crank pretty snuggly so if it is rocking, tilting, wbbling then odds are you need to take it off and inspect.

I could see the balancer loosing some rubber over time which causes the rotation of the engine at high rpms to start to wear into the perfect circle that the HB should. Hopefully it is your HB that got an oval in it and not the end of your crank.

[1-3-2-4]

It was tight, I pulled out my Tq wrench on the highway and took out the drivers side radiator fan and checked and it was not loose at all, on the pictures I saw none of them wore into a perfect circle, but here is a video I did on the side of the highway.

[1-3-2-4]

[liggity]

Mine was wobbling just like that right before this happened....


The rubber just tore all to hell. Replaced it with a Perrin Pulley. You take the whole pulley off and inspect?

[liggity]

Sorry, just saw you did take it off and posted just as I posted.

[1-3-2-4]

Mine seemed to happen because of the woodruff key which is odd.. It did not loosen (bolt) so why after a year and a half this?

[liggity]

Not a clue. All I know is that I've seen that happen before. My only guess is that it's just a flaw that happens over time. I've only seen it happen in really high mileage Subis.

[harrymaneuvers]

Who knows. That bolt hadnt been touched in 75k miles since I bought it and had the used lot do the timing belt too.

I would take a really close look at the woodruff key now that it chewed up the HB like that. If the woodruff key is knarled then you will need to take your timing covers of, remove the crank sprocket and replace the woodruff key with a new one.


This is the point that I discovered the keyway for the woodruff key to sit in was scared.

[liggity]

Luckily mine was ok. I noticed some knocking inside my timing belt cover and figured it was the tensioner gettin loose. So even though it was only 50k into the last timing belt, I changed it. Glad I did too, cause the passenger side cam was a tooth off. Car ran completely different after I fixed that.
So while I did all that I checked the key out too, and all was good. Figure I'll check that every 10K miles now though. haha! Cars up to 167,000 now.

[1-3-2-4]

I'm at 242K on my car

[1-3-2-4]

A little update my perrin crank pulley came in today.. I noticed when I just slid on the pulley and tried to move the crank I felt the key shift, so I took the pulley off and touched the key it moves side to side but the crank sprocket is still on so I think the key broke? or rotated out of the slot?

I wont know until the dealer gets back to me about my new bolt and key that I have been waiting for about a week now.

[harrymaneuvers]

Yea that key should be solid and in place... especially if the crank sprocket is over it too.

[1-3-2-4]

Yeah who knows what happened as soon as the dealer gets back to me I will pick it up, I'm going to be super pissed if they forgot to email me my order was ready and it's been sitting around for 3 days.