JPTL

I'm about to go through John Kelly's manual to try to identify this bolt, but I thought I'd throw it out here in the mean time:
I'm 4/5 done with reassembly after a t-belt job (w/p replace, tensioner rebuilt, new wires). I was getting ready to add coolant, and did a little straightening up. I found a bolt that I apparently overlooked.
Here's a description:
13mm head; 42 mm (about 1 5/8") long with a 15mm shoulder.
I believe that I took this off at an early stage of disassembly (something like a component bracket) and it likely came from the driver's side..but I'm not positive.
I'm thinking (& hoping) that it's external - as opposed to a bolt behind the t/b covers; and it's from a low point of the engine, because the head and threads are pretty greasy. All of the bolts that came out of the block or waterpump were free of grease on both the heads and the threads.
I've been under the car a few times to try to find a hole missing a bolt. My focus is the alternator console, however I can't find anything. Unfortunately, I'm on ramps & not a lift, so it's tight.
Since this was my first job, and I was at the belt removal stage, I was loosening every bolt that I thought would give me belt slack. I likely took this out fully when simply loosening it (or not loosening it at all) may have been enough.
There has to be a finite number of places that take this bolt.
I can't think of a final stage of reassembly that would take this bolt, so I have to assume that I've overlooked something.
Any ideas?

marton

Only one left over? So why are you complaining?

I usually have several left.

13mm is quite small for the front accessories; are you sure you got all the bolts back into the plastic covers over the TB?

Marton

Garth S

Try to slide a mirror up by the alt/PS pump console - maybe you'll find the empty hole: there are 3 mounting bolts IIRC, plus the adjuster.

SeanR

+1

JPTL

Garth/Sean. Dead on!
I crawled under there again with a mission and a mech. mirror. Sure enough, it was the p/s pump-to-bracket lock down bolt (oblong hole). One of those things that you simply can't see from above.
Of course everything was nice & tight, so the bolt didn't just go in. I had to loosen the p/s slider bolts and remove the radiator hose to get a wrench on the lock down bolt once the hole & bracket lined up.
I'm glad that I discovered this before I'd added my coolant.
Thanks guys, for the nail-on-the-head diagnosis.
I was feeling like a surgeon thinking to myself "now where did I leave that scalpel? It could be right in front of my face, or somewhere much less accessible."

Bill Ball

Everybody knows this because they had the same bolt on the floor when they finished. I ended up with an even bigger bolt left over the first time. To this day, 100K mile later, I have never figured out where it came from.

JPTL

Bill, that makes me feel a bit less like an idiot. 100k? Wow. I guess that's a testimonial to our cars being engineered like tanks. With both beefy slider bolts properly tightened, I can't imagine that p/s pump every loosening - even without the lockdown bolt.
I was half thinking that if I hadn't found where the bolt went that I'd just start driving - and carefully listening for something starting to get loose.
That would have made me nuts, however. Similar to the edgy feeling that I had every time that I got on it with a 10 year old timing belt (but that's now behind me)

FlyingDog

You mean you're not supposed to have spare parts? Uh oh.

Bill Ball

Since I never found where ne large leftover bolt went, it must have been a spare. Further evidence of German over-engineering - they include spare bolts.