How much alt/fan movement is okay?

[jhelgesen]

Went to change my fan belt the other day, put the new one on, adjusted it as loose as posible but it was still too tight. Pulled the fan down to rub on the fan housing. How much should the fan be able to move in the housing, or is my alt loose?

[304065]

John, there should be no movement of the fan in the housing whatsoever. Once the fan is bolted tight to the alternator shaft with a woodruff key installed, the only play should be from the alternator bearings but we're not talking about much.

Something's amiss. So. . .

1) Disconnect the battery negative terminal;
2) Remove the 22mm nut holding the fan to the alternator. Be sure to use the factory tool with the two pins to hold it, if you stick something in the blades to hold it you might snap a blade off ($$$).
3) Remove the belt. When you do so, count the number of shims that are on the outside of the pulley half, and the number of shims on the inside. Make a note of this. The number should total six.
4) Remove the coil bracket, two 13mm bolts, set coil and bracket aside.
5) Remove the 10mm bolts that hold the fan housing to the cooling shroud.
5) Remove the 14mm bolts that hold the fan strap in place.
6) At this point the fan housing should pivot forward. Make a careful note of what wire is connected to what terminal on the back of the housing. Label the wires with a piece of masking tape D-, B+, D+/61, DF. Those labels should correspond to what it says on the back of the alternator. Now remove the wires, 10mm and 8mm nuts. Don't forget to remove the grounding strap, 10mm nut.
7) Remove fan shroud as a unit and take to bench for inspection.

There should be six (only five still there, you took one off with the grounding strap) nuts that hold the alternator in the housing. Try to rock the alt back and forth. It shouldn't move. Look at the four vanes that hold the alternator in the center of the shroud. None should be cracked. Now, remove the fan by carefully pulling it off. You might whack the alternator shaft carefully with a rubber hammer, don't bugger the threads, though. If it was rocking, you might see damage to the shaft. Finally, wiggle the alternator shaft. It shouldn't move.

Somewhere, something has given way to cause the wiggle.