How do I remove bottom pulley?

[The Mighty Elvi]

I recently had a bit if a burbley noise in the engine bay, sounded like it was coming from the alternator pulley or bearing.

Just removed the alternator and it's fine, The noise is coming from the bottom pulley which has a bit of wobble. It has three alan bolts securing the main shaft bolt (?) which feels round inside and outside.  So how to I remove the pulley and what's the solution for fixing the wobble?

91 16V

thanks.

[rubjonny]

do you mean the pulley without a belt on it? if so thats the waterpump, the solution is to take it off and buy a new waterpump!

[The Mighty Elvi]

That's the one, directly underneath the alternator.

So how do i remove it?

[plasticfantastic]

if you only want to remove the pulley then just undo the 3 allen screws,

but if your pump is dead the i think there are 4 allen screws on the front of the block holding it on.

[The Mighty Elvi]

I have no issues with overheating or leaking water, it's just the noise.  It did coincide with a return trip from South Wales to Northampton the other day.  As I've said when I grab the pulley I have up/down left/right play in it.  The pulley itself sems firmly attached, the play seem to come from inside the water pump housing, if you know what I mean.

[rubjonny]

yeah you'll be needing a nerw waterpump unfortunatly. get a complete unit rather than just the impeller half, not much more and it saves trying to get the bolts out which often snap.  you need to remove the alternator bracket 1st, 4 nuts then the bolt thru the bottom, you can just see the nut on the end in the pic above. pop that out and it'll come away. then waterpump held on with 4 bolts/studs.

I'd buy a new thermostat plus housing while you're there, and make sure the pump comes with replacement block and thermostat orings, they normally do.

you'll loose all the coolant out the block when the pump is off, so its a good time to do a full coolant flush

[danny_p]

it's also worth checking the pully is straight while it's off

[rubjonny]

oh and that you can actually remove the pulley, would suck if you took it all off and couldnt get the pulley off 
I use waterpump pliers to hold 2 of the bolts while I crack loose the 3rd, spin it round and repeat. For some reason I found it only worked if you held the bolts 1 way with the pliers, with the other way it would just slip right off.  Bit fiddly but is doable on your own, a helper makes the job easier though.

these things:


another method I've used in the past is 2 allen keys, put 1 allen key on the bolt you want to loosen and brace a 2nd key up to it, then crack it loose.  you'll end up re-tightening the last bolt, but it should be pretty easy to loosen it again since you've already had it loose.

Oh and sometimes the pulley has a handy hole you can poke something thru to bace it to the block, or you could buy a proper tool from the bay of e, has a triangle hole thru it which holds all 3 bolts at the same time

[plasticfantastic]

I usually find a bit of heat and the two allen key system works well

[Ben Lessani]

I have just tensioned the belt and locked it to crack the water pump pulley bolts.