Fan hub wobble...possible damage to anyhting?

[FlaCarrera]

I had my fan bead blasted & powder coated, looked nice.

Anyway, the powder coater also didn't block the fan shaft hole and key way. Wrench re-installs the fan after scraping out the shaft hole & keyway. In short order the spinning hub chewed up the coating and now has a bad case of the off center pulley wobblies which I don't catch until after a 30 minute track session. Pulley hub has now made a good start at eating the fan boss. With help of a DE instructor , we got the hub somewhat re-centered and I limped home at low RPMs as the belt was now very loose.

Two questions; could alternator have been damaged? Would vibration have been the cause of severe engine stumbling above 4200 RPM...I'm thinking maybe the rev limiter sensed vibration? Also had backfire when lifting off the gas. The wrench did clean out a damp distributor cap which had caused a no start problem a few days earlier. Could he have thrown the timing off by carelessly re-ataching the distrubutor cap? I picked up the car the day before DE & no chance to test drive.

Obviously I'm not a DIYr. BTW wrench is replacing the fan with a new one including powder coating & offerd to pay for my DE track fee...he felt bad.

Ted in So. Fla
86 Carrera Targa Blk/Blk

[Tyson Schmidt]

The alternator probably wasn't damaged. The fan boss can be welded and reground and the outer pulley half replaced. Problem fixed.

The rev limiter won't respond to engine vibrations.

The distributor cap doesn't effect timing. Besides, your car's timing is controlled by the DME which gets it's reference from the crank angle sensors off the flywheel.

The miss above 4500 may be due to a stuck mechanical rotor advancer in the distributor. This device advances the rotor so that as the computer advances the ignition timing, the rotor advances along with it so that it is pointing properly at the correct pole in the cap. If it doesn't, it can cross fire to another cylinder at high RPM.

To check it, pull the cap and twist the rotor. If it moves freely in one direction about 1/16th of a turn then snaps back by spring tension, it's O.K. If it is sticky or doesn't move at all, it needs attention.