Need Help! Rebuilding Engine!

[Enthuzed1]

Ok, so i'm putting the engine back together ( hopefully correctly!) and the lower balance shaft sprocket will not rotate at all....all the other sprockets rotate freely and this thing will not budge....can someone maybe lead me in the right direction? Thanks guys.....

[Zero10]

That sprocket really should rotate, I'm sure you know that though.
Is the bolt on it broken off? It looks like it is.
Was anything done to it? Did it turn before?

[perfecto951]

is the key jamed in the wrong way? is the woodruff key in?
thats the only thing i could possibly see.
Come to think of it, it should still rotate even if that were the case.

[mike944]

Did you remove the bolt holding the sprocket on? I hope so, because it's missing. That's a problem.

Pull the sprocket off (it should slide right off pretty easily) and see if the shaft turns then. The only thing i can think of is if somebody replaced the seal, and forgot to put on the spacer, then the sprocket could slide on too far, and could bind up against the housing.

[perfecto951]

My god. I'm an idiot. After reading this post again i decided to go out to my garage and check my work (that i did like 4 weeks ago) and surprise, surprise - my sproket doesn't turn either. And the funny thing is, i KNOW i put everything back toghether right.

I'm going to take it all apart and look it over. I think the end cap for the shaft may be on too tight, or it may be un-centered.

[ilikemy944]

Speaking of which perfecto... hows it coming?

[perfecto951]

it's coming. i just need time and money....so, nothing is new really!

[Enthuzed1]

Alright....so i'm off today, i'll see what i can do to get it rotating...hopefully it's nothing more than a slight adjustment.....this should be fun........

[carsontc]

from Danno in another thread far away

"...Be VERY, VERY careful to mark the bearing-cap so that you do not install it back up-side down. It will go back in with either orientation, but will only correctly fit one way. If it's reversed, it'll bind the bearing..."

[perfecto951]

are these are the bearings at the back of the shaft? There are 2 caps, right next to eachother - right?

[perfecto951]

also, is it normal for the entire shaft to move fowards and backwards? Because mine has about 1/2 inch of front to rear movement.

[Enthuzed1]

well, i didn't go as far as checking the bearings, but i also have about a 1/2 inch of back and forth movement. Oh and besides the oil seal and the little plastic seal behind the sleeve, are there any other seals/gaskets i need? I don't remember if i took anything else out.....

[perfecto951]

i think there are 4 seal per shaft in toal.

[fast924S]

HAHAHA, Im in the middle of building my 924S agian, motor is half way out of the car, now all I need is more money

[ae1969]

Originally posted by carsontc
from Danno in another thread far away

"...Be VERY, VERY careful to mark the bearing-cap so that you do not install it back up-side down. It will go back in with either orientation, but will only correctly fit one way. If it's reversed, it'll bind the bearing..."

When doing a front seal job you wont touch these. The entire balance shaft cover has to come off to get at the bearing bridges.

There is an onion type seal and a regular oil seal on each camshaft that you can access when doing the front.

Lots of questions here.....

Enthuzed1- The shaft has play in it..... When you torque the front bolt holding the gear it sets the shaft where it has to be. You should be able to pull the shaft in and out and have it turn freely. As far as I can tell the gear is facing out correctly, but it may be out of orientation (this would not cause it to bind).

Perfect- IF you torqued up that balance shaft and it wont turn. Check to see if you placed the gear upside down. The O has to be visible as in enthuzeds picture.

[mike944]

Originally posted by perfecto951
also, is it normal for the entire shaft to move fowards and backwards? Because mine has about 1/2 inch of front to rear movement.

When the gear is not installed, and the seal is off, and the spacer is out, then it's normal to have 1/2 of front to back play. With all these parts properly installed, no, you should only have less than 1/16" movement in and out.

If your gear is installed, and you still have that much movement, sounds like your spacer is possibly installed backwards, that's the only thing i can think of. This is only possible to do if you removed the seal, since the spacer can not be removed and reversed when the seal is still installed. The spacer is number 4 in the following image, sorry for the poor resolution.



With everything installed correctly, if you remove the gear, the spacer will only look like a sleeve over the balance shaft. In actuality, it has a flange on the other side (behind the seal) The flange on the spacer is 1/2 of the thrust bearing for the balance shaft. The other half of the thrust bearing is part of the balance shaft itself. This second half of the thrust bearing is visable if you remove the part labeled 17 and 25, the cover. These 2 faces set the clearance.

If you have 1/2" play, something is seriously wrong. I would say the spacer is missing, but then there would be nothing for the seal to ride against, and your balance shaft would be leaking so bad you would probably run out of oil within an hour or so.