This past Wednesday!
Oooooohhhh if it weren't for my truck, I'd have no truck a'tall...
Well, it started out to be a fairly simple set of tasks: Replace the front crankshat oil seal, the oil pump o-ring, since one must remove the oil pump to change the crankshaft oil seal, then replace the hoses and flush out the radiator. Summer's coming, and in Yuma, that's serious business!
So, I loosen off all the belts on the main pully, easy enough, there's only 3, and 2 of them have their own little idler wheels, just loosen them up, and bingo! the belt's loose. Then I go to take off the bolt holding the pully on the crankshaft. Yeah, right. Not a chance, pal. I was moving the truck against the entire drive train including the emergency brake, I was cranking on it so hard (I didn't know I was still that strong! Kinda a good feeling, actually...). OK, itme for a little trick I learned the first time I did this: put the wrench against a frame member and tap the starter. May be a real good idea to pull the coil wire off the coil first though, so it can't possibly start with me attached to the main pully! So, all this is done, the bolt seems to break loose. Still won't turn. Wind up backing the bolt all the way out using the starter. Seems it had rusted it's self in pretty solid in the 175,000 miles since I last had to do this. Oh, yes, shredded the threads during this whole process. Dandy, now I have to retap the crank shaft, and hopefully be able to save enough threads on the bolt to make it work again.
In the mean time though, I can get the oil seal replaced, no problem there, and get the oil pump back on. Boy, that darn oil pump o-ring just did NOT want to stay in place, so I finally just held it as best I could and jammed the pump on...I thought I had it...Foolish mortal, You get in a hurry, don't do the job correctly, ie: put a little grease in the o-ring's channel and it'll hold it in place while you put the pump on. But noooo...
Also took the opportunity to replace the hoses at this point. All three came off easy and went on easy. I had a sudden premonition of impending doom. It NEVER goes this easy. Something is very wrong. Something very bad is going to happen, You just wait and see...
Off my friend & I go in search of the right size tap and die set. Good bloody luck! It seems that this size is just not available in this silly little town...Did find a replacement bolt though, so there's one sigh of relief. It pays to have a friend who knows people who work in the machine shop in the back of an auto parts store! Still searching for the tap though...When LO! My prayers are answered! I tell You folks, Harbor Freight Tools constantly suprises me. The cost of the tap and die set that had the size I needed in it surprized me too: $85.00. But it's that or my truck sits until I put in a new crankshaft...hmmm...let's see which is the better choice here...DUH!
Home again..of course by now I'm getting tired, cranky and somewhat annoyed with the whole situation. Try and try to get the damn tap to start into the old threads that are left in the crank...and over and over it seems to want to cock over to one side. What a royal pain in my ass...finally I get a bigger wrench, and I think I have it (if at first You don't succeed, get a bigger hammer!)...I rethread the crankshaft, very nice job of it too, if I do say so myself, the new bolt just breezes right on in and out no problems. Cool! Finally making some darned progress here!
I slap the pully back on, and lo and behold, the damned key that keeps the pully from spinning on the crank, a little rectangular piece of steel, has gang aft agley. Let's be clear here folks: I'm a shade-tree mechanic...my "garage" floor is dirt (actually the top 3/4" or so is a very fine dust. Think about it!), leaves, etc. Now I get to search for the lost key. Finally find that, and stick it in the crankshaft with some grease...yeah, remember that little trick from before? ANyway, the pully goes on, the bolt spins home very smoothly, and looky looky! There's a gap on one side, that's not on the other. I tapped the damned crankshaft cock-eyed! Bad names and dirty words, screw it, it'll hold the pully on just fine.
Put the belts back on, dumped in the radiator flush, filled it up with water, and it's time for the "big moment". My SO got in and started her up, no problems there...looks good...uh-oh, what's dripping under there? Usually at this point it's a little water, maybe spilled some filling up the radiator, maybe one of the hose clamps isn't quite tight enough, no big deal...WRONG!!!!
Remeber that premonition of disaster? Well, I was right. It was leaking oil from the oil pump. The damned o-ring hadn't stayed in it's channel. My fault, stupidity, and getting in a hurry caused me to cut a corner. Now I pay the price.
Well, We shut it off, and, since it's 1700, decide that that's the end of the work day. Unfortunatley, since I start my work week Thursday, I won't be able to get back to it until sometime next week. When You work a 14 hour day, all You have time for, really, is work, come home, eat, sleep, get up, shower, go to work, repeat. More bad names and dirty words, lots of self-recriminations...but it's too late now. Get wahsed up, patch up a small hole in my pinky finger, and it's off to feed the bunnies, then to the store to lay in supplies for the work week and such. Damn was I ever tired, too...
And there, in a nutshell, folks, was my Wednesday. So it's really, really BIG nutshell. So sue me!
Well, it started out to be a fairly simple set of tasks: Replace the front crankshat oil seal, the oil pump o-ring, since one must remove the oil pump to change the crankshaft oil seal, then replace the hoses and flush out the radiator. Summer's coming, and in Yuma, that's serious business!
So, I loosen off all the belts on the main pully, easy enough, there's only 3, and 2 of them have their own little idler wheels, just loosen them up, and bingo! the belt's loose. Then I go to take off the bolt holding the pully on the crankshaft. Yeah, right. Not a chance, pal. I was moving the truck against the entire drive train including the emergency brake, I was cranking on it so hard (I didn't know I was still that strong! Kinda a good feeling, actually...). OK, itme for a little trick I learned the first time I did this: put the wrench against a frame member and tap the starter. May be a real good idea to pull the coil wire off the coil first though, so it can't possibly start with me attached to the main pully! So, all this is done, the bolt seems to break loose. Still won't turn. Wind up backing the bolt all the way out using the starter. Seems it had rusted it's self in pretty solid in the 175,000 miles since I last had to do this. Oh, yes, shredded the threads during this whole process. Dandy, now I have to retap the crank shaft, and hopefully be able to save enough threads on the bolt to make it work again.
In the mean time though, I can get the oil seal replaced, no problem there, and get the oil pump back on. Boy, that darn oil pump o-ring just did NOT want to stay in place, so I finally just held it as best I could and jammed the pump on...I thought I had it...Foolish mortal, You get in a hurry, don't do the job correctly, ie: put a little grease in the o-ring's channel and it'll hold it in place while you put the pump on. But noooo...
Also took the opportunity to replace the hoses at this point. All three came off easy and went on easy. I had a sudden premonition of impending doom. It NEVER goes this easy. Something is very wrong. Something very bad is going to happen, You just wait and see...
Off my friend & I go in search of the right size tap and die set. Good bloody luck! It seems that this size is just not available in this silly little town...Did find a replacement bolt though, so there's one sigh of relief. It pays to have a friend who knows people who work in the machine shop in the back of an auto parts store! Still searching for the tap though...When LO! My prayers are answered! I tell You folks, Harbor Freight Tools constantly suprises me. The cost of the tap and die set that had the size I needed in it surprized me too: $85.00. But it's that or my truck sits until I put in a new crankshaft...hmmm...let's see which is the better choice here...DUH!
Home again..of course by now I'm getting tired, cranky and somewhat annoyed with the whole situation. Try and try to get the damn tap to start into the old threads that are left in the crank...and over and over it seems to want to cock over to one side. What a royal pain in my ass...finally I get a bigger wrench, and I think I have it (if at first You don't succeed, get a bigger hammer!)...I rethread the crankshaft, very nice job of it too, if I do say so myself, the new bolt just breezes right on in and out no problems. Cool! Finally making some darned progress here!
I slap the pully back on, and lo and behold, the damned key that keeps the pully from spinning on the crank, a little rectangular piece of steel, has gang aft agley. Let's be clear here folks: I'm a shade-tree mechanic...my "garage" floor is dirt (actually the top 3/4" or so is a very fine dust. Think about it!), leaves, etc. Now I get to search for the lost key. Finally find that, and stick it in the crankshaft with some grease...yeah, remember that little trick from before? ANyway, the pully goes on, the bolt spins home very smoothly, and looky looky! There's a gap on one side, that's not on the other. I tapped the damned crankshaft cock-eyed! Bad names and dirty words, screw it, it'll hold the pully on just fine.
Put the belts back on, dumped in the radiator flush, filled it up with water, and it's time for the "big moment". My SO got in and started her up, no problems there...looks good...uh-oh, what's dripping under there? Usually at this point it's a little water, maybe spilled some filling up the radiator, maybe one of the hose clamps isn't quite tight enough, no big deal...WRONG!!!!
Remeber that premonition of disaster? Well, I was right. It was leaking oil from the oil pump. The damned o-ring hadn't stayed in it's channel. My fault, stupidity, and getting in a hurry caused me to cut a corner. Now I pay the price.
Well, We shut it off, and, since it's 1700, decide that that's the end of the work day. Unfortunatley, since I start my work week Thursday, I won't be able to get back to it until sometime next week. When You work a 14 hour day, all You have time for, really, is work, come home, eat, sleep, get up, shower, go to work, repeat. More bad names and dirty words, lots of self-recriminations...but it's too late now. Get wahsed up, patch up a small hole in my pinky finger, and it's off to feed the bunnies, then to the store to lay in supplies for the work week and such. Damn was I ever tired, too...
And there, in a nutshell, folks, was my Wednesday. So it's really, really BIG nutshell. So sue me!