I have had to deal with this twice this week and I am curious how you guys do it. Is there any easy way with the starter in? Any tricks?

I have seen this flywheel lock but doesn't the starter have to be out for this to work?

HERE

 

There are sevaral ways:

Purists will say to buy the ~$40 toothed tool that bolts to the starter motor holes and holds the flywheel securely. This definitely works.

Non-purists (and maybe the Haynes manual?) say jam a heavy duty screwdriver into into the teeth of the flywheel, to prevent rotation of the crank. This works, but I never tried it.

Airplane folks will say stuff some clean nylon rope into cylinder one after removing the spark plug. When the piston gets to the top, the bunched-up rope impedes further travel and crank rotation, and you can torque the bolt against this pressure. Purists will howl at this idea, but every A&P airplane mechanic in the known universe can tell you that purists don't know squat.

 

Yes the starter must be removed. That is the only way to do it.

 

I did it tonight without doing so.

 

I used a large screw driver and placed it in the inspection hole? in the side of the bell housing. There is just enough of the flywheel showing that if you get a good grip on it, it will hold all 155 ft lbs. Took a couple tries but I got it with a buddy helping out.

 

Congrats.

 

lol. It was difficult but with some patience and the correct lighting I was able to move it into place. It might have just been easier to remove the starter to get a clear shot at it but the starter bolts were rusted and I didn't want to open another can of worms. So thats it? Nothing else. I was hoping someone on here had a better way to do it. O well.

 

I have not tried it, but how about just putting it in 5th gear and pull the handbrake. There will probably be some annoying “springiness” when tightening the crank bolt (for the pulley I assume), but it should be possible.

 

For tightening, those types of things may work. For removing a bolt that's been on for years, you need the flywheel lock....or you risk screwing something up in my opinion (e.g., snapping off a flywheel tooth).

 

I thought about that but didn't want to be the first to try it.

 

Using the handbrake as a lock and the transmission to transmit the torque will not overstress any component. Several Rennlisters have shown that the all the components after the engine can handle at least 3 times the 155 ft-lb tightening torque.

The question is if the handbrake (e-brake) is adequate to hold the car. The rear wheels will be exposed to 0.829 * 3.375 * 155 ft-lb = 433 ft-lb, which is equivalent to 4 - 5 wheel nuts being tightened at the same time. If that is more than the handbrake can handle, then a helper could step on the brake pedal.

 

How accurate is your torque spec. really going to be for tightening the crank bolt against an assembly that is not rigid? In other words, if you're using the "leave the car in gear" method, the springiness of the clutch is going to throw off your measurement of the torque spec. for the crank bolt. For this reason, I'd use the flywheel lock. They're cheap enough.

 

You can use an old cranshaft bearing shell instead of the flywheel lock, but the starter still needs to be removed.

Laust: I could not use that method, no matter which gear, the engine still turned.

 

Removing the starter is easy except for the fact that the bolts are usually VERY tight. On two of my cars I had to use a 4' breaker bar (the same one I use to remove the crank pulley bolt) in order to get them loose. Fortunately they're relatively easy to get at. The starter only requires those two bolts and the two nuts holding the wiring (one big, one little - 10mm and 6mm IIRC) to be removed. Quite simple.

 

IMO, the Bolt On Lock is the only way to get a true reading on the torque.