plpete84

Does anyone make a oil fed drive belt pulleys? I used to think that the metal roller pulleys were the better kind vs the newer revised plastic ones. I've seen the plastic ones crumble and fail and while in pieces taking the belt with them, however, it seems like the metal ones are not bulletproof either....

I did a weekend road trip to Philly to hang out with dad for his 66th trip around the sun which totaled about 300 miles. Not the trip around the sun...the trip to Philly and back Car ran beautifully with a few trips into the triple digits on the way back. On the way there I might have hit a new record in terms of fuel economy, cruising in the mid 70mph. Still amazed at the efficiency of this motor while giving you a nice power bump.



The fun times ended once I got off the highway and into DC. I had a podcast on but seemed to hear some sort of noise. I paused the podcast and cracked the window open and heard some sort of rattle. The engine seemed to idle fine at the moment so wasn't sure if it was me or another pile of bolts rolling down the road. I tapped the gas pedal and it seemed to quiet down a bit. I drove another mile and the noise got a bit louder, especially once I stopped at a light. At that point the idle got a little rough and the engine shut off. Right before that happened I heard a metallic rattle that was definitely coming from my car. I thought "****, well that's not good!" Turned on the hazards and got out to see if I can spot anything in the engine compartment or under the car. Nothing - everything was bone dry. I tried to start the car but it would just about crank over once and nothing. I immediately called Brandon who answered the phone right away. Understandably, there is only so much he could have done in the moment and the situation seemed unusual and a first to him. I was asked to try to manually turn over the engine and see if there is any resistance as I do so. I have a 24mm socket so that wouldn't be a problem. Based on that we would ciome up with further investigation. Somewhat ironically, this happened 2.8 miles from where I live! I requested a flatbed from Geico and the driver showed up in a little under an hour. Cool dude who also owns a 2004 Cayenne.



Once I got home, my neighbor was outside, and with a flashlight on I was able to quickly remove the airbox and try to rotate the engine manually per Brandon's suggestion. There was some resistance but nothing I haven't felt before doing this, especially with the spark plugs in. Still pretty confused I pulled off the belt and tried to manually spin all the accessories - AC compressor, power steering pump, water pump and all the pulleys. All the sudden, BINGO! We have a winner!



The upper belt drive pulley would not turn at all and was sitting a little crooked! Well sh*t, how did that happen?! The bolt securing the upper pulley was plenty tight so this was not a situation of it not being torqued properly and the pulley basically lose and shaking itself apart. I looked around the motor some more and found the following:



Looks like the bearing inside of the roller went "huck tuah" and spat out a piece of the bearing race as it started to disintegrate itself!



I went inside and ordered a new set of pulleys from FCP which should arrive in just a few days. I pulled off the other pulleys and looking over the upper one, you can see why there was metallic noise coming out of the engine. The thing basically ate itself and spat out chewed up pieces like a misbehaved child. So looks like no matter the type of pulley you have, metal one like mine, or the newer plastic ones, they are both susceptible to failure. Let this serve as a PSA to replace yours or take them off to inspect, pull the seals from the bearings and apply some new fresh grease. It also looks like the tensioner really applies a good amount of tension to the belt to the point where it wouldn't allow the belt to slip at all and thus preventing the engine from starting.



3 days later, the new pulleys arrived and went on the engine. I thought I ordered the tensioner pulley as well but looks like I forgot to add it to the cart. I plan on taking it off (it's a bit of PITA) this weekend during the oil change to inspect and service the bearing. Now is the engine going to engine?? With some encouragement from my portable jump starter, the car fired right up and no metallic or any other funky noises! Great success!!!



Funny part is that people say that a Porsche will give you several warnings and an opportunity to fix a potential issue before that car just craps out on your and refuses to move forward like a misbehaving dog that just lays down on the ground. You can pull on it all you want but you ain't going anywhere! I've reached out to Brandon previously regarding a strange whine that would come from the engine. It kind of sounded like I had a supercharger strapped to my M96 and would really become audible at around 2.5k to 3.5k RPMs. I have driven my friends Lotus Emira which actually has a supercharger and this was louder than that. He was actually a bit jealous hah! We thought it might be the power steering pump, although seemed unlikely. Fluid levels were fine and steering felt normal. Perhaps something transmission related? Not really as revving the motor with clutch pressed in or in neutral made no difference. The clutch disc itself was in perfect shape and I have a fairly new flywheel as well. Well, looks like we have our answer about where the noise was coming from.

Other than this little adventure I removed the old tint which was starting to slowly fail and got new ceramic one installed. Should help protect the leather.



I also repainted the front lip in GT Silver and applied some PPF to it to help make it look decent for longer. It was my first time working with PPF. I did an ok job and it's a good five-footer I think.



I'm at about 4500mi on the motor already, which means that I'm due for my next oil change. The future intervals will be a 5k miles unless a shorter one is needed. Curious to see how the 2nd oil change looks like on the UOA too, so will be sharing that.

KJinDC

Glad it was relatively minor. There are certainly some places in the city I wouldn't want to be broken down in! I'll PM you to figure out a chance to catch up in the next couple of weeks if you're free.

GC996

Pete, glad you figured it out and fixed it.

plpete84

Thanks gents. I had a few folks stop to see if all is ok and one guy told me that I should get a Lamborghini instead. I'm sure there was a joke in there but it went over my head in the moment.

As the car hit 114,999 miles as I last parked it, I went ahead and did the 2nd oil change on the engine this weekend. This was a shorter interval of about 2500 miles and I put in my last case of FR50 that I had. My thought process was to do the 1st change as soon as I got home with the new motor and then another shorter one as the engine continues to settle in. I should have the UOA from this one in a little while. At this point I am at 4,340 miles on the new motor since collecting it at Slakker. Next OCI will be at 5k miles and am thinking on sticking with FR50 and moving to DI50 for warmer months since 15w weight might not be ideal for winter weather. DC winter is a hit or miss last few years. I also pulled the UIDS as I had a small amount of seepage happening since the sump has been off a few times since installing it. Skip sent me a new seal when I got the baffle system so I was all good there. Everything was clean with nothing to report there, which is a good thing.



I also took the opportunity to remove the belt tensioner pulley for service. It's a bit of a PITA but I got it off in a few minutes. I popped the bearing seal, cleaned it out and packed it with some fresh high-temp grease I had. It seemed to spin smoothly but now I'll know it's fine for sure and as I like to say, "they always run best right before they blow up"

Time to rack up some more miles and get some new photos, while summer is still here!