JayVee

The washer went in the hole, but maybe the bolt didn't? When I dropped mine I didn't see where it landed and feared the worst. Later I found it resting on the ledge over the oil pan on the intake side of the engine block. I was under the car at the time (looking in the clutch inspection hole) and I just reached up and felt it resting there. Before you take too much apart it's worth a good look around the garage floor etc. just in case.

944Ross

What happens if the bolt gets between the crank web and the flywheel?! Nothing good, I guarantee it. Cast aluminum is < 1/3 the strength of steel, even cheap bolt material.

Unless you've looked everywhere, like JayVee did, I wouldn't panic yet.

KuHL 951

I was finishing up a clutch job so the TT wasn't connected yet. I tried all the mentioned tricks except the water. I removed the BH, PP, and FW and the bolt was on the drivers side. Mine went down the square hole not the sensor openings. As mentioned above it's a gamble with it getting wedged and doing damage, you have to make that call. I would keep looking for it until I was sure it's in the BH.

luftpirate

Just did this tonight, sensor bolt. Glad I'm not the only one I feel like such an idiot. I removed the starter and the bottom bell housing plate. I can see it is wedged between the flywheel and the back of the engine. There is not enough room for it to slide down through there. Im going to try to magnetize I small shim of steel and push it back up from the bottom tomorrow. At which point I hope I can grab it with another magnet from the top. I can't believe that hole didn't have a cover, its almost as if it was designed to catch bolts. No doubt a 5 min job changing out a sensor has likely turned into a 4 week job for me if I have to pull the damn torque tube/tranny out and drop the bell housing.

Mark944na86

Good luck -- that's a bugger (but very easy to have happen, unfortunately).

luftpirate

Does anyone have a picture of the back side of the block?
I pushed the bolt up and now I cant see it anymore. I turned the engine over by hand, thought I heard it drop but its still somewhere in the bell housing. It looks like the flywheel has a groove cut down the side, I guess its possible it could slip down along the side through that, I tried to probe it was a coat hanger with no avail. Im just wondering if its possible it could have slipped forward (back) somehow and got in the clutch fork area, I probed with my magnet but no luck. This is turning ugly quick. I'm going to see if I can find a bore scope possibly.

choinga

man, i guess i got lucky on this one...first time I pulled my bellhousing ground off to clean it I didn't have that thing covered up...freaked me out when I read some random post later about this and I realized I was wrenching blind down there with that hole wide open. Whew. Guess the Porsche gods spared me on that one (and then got back at me when I had to cut half the bolts that were rusted to hell getting my stock WG out to replace it with a Tial...)

luftpirate

Success!!!



Broken hard drive magnet taped to coat hangar thingy saves the day! I was able to get it into the lower hole below the sensors and get it in sideways past the flywheel to the back side of the engine. I had tried everywhere else, just guessing and finally came up lucky. I can't say how relieved I am to have this out now hopefully I can enjoy a sunny weekend! Thanks for all the ideas I was about 30 min away from buying a $300 6mm bore scope off Ebay.

Mark944na86

Very cool man -- you are a clever dude.