TD4 Crank Pully Clatter

This week my 2000 TD4 developed a deadful rattle from the engine bay, the area seemed like it might be the splashield agaisnt the pulleys as found by others.

BUT

sadly not

took said cover off an hour ago and identifed rattle as coming from the Crankshaft Pulley. Does this come in 2 parts as it seems to have an outer that has slipped against the inner leaving "rubbing" witness marks.

Anyone else had this, or know more about this item :-

Update:-

That pulley is vibration damped.
Local independant said they had never known one fail (heard that before) but it is supposed to have relative movement and may be loose or breaking up.

The centre bolt holds it against the timing chain pully over a woodruff key on the crank. They reckon checking if it is indeed loose - but to tighten it you have to lock the engine by removing the starter and wedging a a large flat bladed screwdriver in the flywheel - no job is ever easy !

Gets worse:-

The pully costs £195 inc VAT


Will do some more investigation.

Almost forgot,

There is very fine metalallic "dust" thrown up on that side of the engine, which I assume is the result of some rubbing contact.

The crankshaft pulley has an inner concentric section bonded to it by a rubber bush, similar to a suspension bush. You can see this in the picture. This permits it to move angularly relative to the pulley through several degrees. This reduces torsional vibrations in the crankshaft which would otherwise lead to crankshaft failure. (Called a Lanchester Damper). All pulleys should show the polishing indicated on your picture otherwise they are not working correctly.
The problem may be that the bonding of the bush has broken. Can you see signs of a crack in the rubber (probably near to /at the inner surface?
The bolt retaining the pulley is tightened to yield when assembled (i.e. stretched) so is very, very, very tight! All the torque for the ancilliaries is transmitted by the friction between the crankshaft and the pulley by the force provided this bolt. It must of course be replaced because it could easily break if re-used. I needed a 4 ft tube on the end of the socket to move mine! (3/4" square socket set).
You also need a special tool to hold the crank againt the spanner torque. You can see the castellations provided on the pulley for this. Putting something in the starter ring may damage the ring gear. I had mine off a few weeks ago because the front oil seal went. (About an hours job with the tool whicch I made).
Contact me directly if you think I can be of help. Best of luck.

Thanks for that Vic.

That was more info than I got from anyone professional.

The Haynes manual says to use the screwdriver method - but I reckoned that was at the very least tricky and, more likely dangerous due to the 100ftlb initial torque needed plus 3 further torque turns.

Funnily enough I have a 3/4 drive and 4foot scaffold for removing the Compensating Nut from the crank on my Clasic Harley Shovelhead (that takes 150ftlb to tighten)

I also reckoned the castelled ring had something to do with it though Haynes is very elusive about this (and many other things)

Breakup of the rubber of bond would probably cause an oscillation that could cause all the symptons I have.

Sorted.

Got the car back today from the local independant.

Crank pully inner rubber damper had totally disintegrated.

Needed new pulley + bolt and auxiliary belt, total cost with 1.5hrs labour and VAT at the "old" rate £288

runs real quiet now, was the first one they had seen fail on a TD4 but they had previously had 2 fail on P38 Rangies with the BMW engine

Thats the exact thing wot happened with mine an 03 td4 auto ,now runs sweet as ever the garage did say they reckon someone has fiddled about the pulley though as it was missing a woodruf key and was skimmed/chipped on the pulley , they had to heat the bolt to remove it too and ourcostof the thing was £212ex vat so your well lucky but we didnt have the time to call round findin cheaper

Drew

Mark2. I have posted a Thread about my noisey TD4 engine. On my thread there is a video so that people can hear what my engine sounds like. Any chance you could have a look and tell me if you had a similar noise please

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f9/what-does-your-td4-engine-sound-like-119660.html

nitropaul said:

Mark2. I have posted a Thread about my noisey TD4 engine. On my thread there is a video so that people can hear what my engine sounds like. Any chance you could have a look and tell me if you had a similar noise please

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f9/what-does-your-td4-engine-sound-like-119660.html

Click to expand...

The noise is in the right area to be the crank pulley. why don't you remove the splash shield and take a look at the face of the pulley for evidence of movement between the inner and outer sections?

nitropaul said:

Mark2. I have posted a Thread about my noisey TD4 engine. On my thread there is a video so that people can hear what my engine sounds like. Any chance you could have a look and tell me if you had a similar noise please

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f9/what-does-your-td4-engine-sound-like-119660.html

Click to expand...

If you note - I had already posted in that thread of yours to say injector or crank pully

Does sound like it, and glad you found this thread

Had this vibration damped pulley fail couple of years back (well why not, everything else on this poorly built piece of schite has failed). The pulley is very heavy and cost about $600AUD, and interesting to note that it failed a month or so after the drive belts were replaced and I felt they had been over-tightened.

But now the seal behind it has gone :-( Engine has done 240,000Km

Does anyone know if this is a straight forward fix from the front of the engine or does the whole bl00dy crank have to be removed? While I am at it, are there any other parts I should replace regardless (besides the whole car)?

I finally sorted the blinkers/indicators. The relay clatter that stops the engine when the blinkers were turned-on turned out to be the hazard light switch. By unplugging the big red hazard light switch and hit wiring pins 4 and 5 of the bottom row of pins in the socket where the hazard switch came from, the blinkers will work normally. Saves spending $400 AUD on a new hazard switch.

Woops what's that noise??? Oh the rear diff torque mounting bracket bush has failed again. That's cheap, only another $150 AUD (75 quid in Pommy language)

Stephen_Aust said:

Had this vibration damped pulley fail couple of years back (well why not, everything else on this poorly built piece of schite has failed). The pulley is very heavy and cost about $600AUD, and interesting to note that it failed a month or so after the drive belts were replaced and I felt they had been over-tightened.

But now the seal behind it has gone :-( Engine has done 240,000Km

Does anyone know if this is a straight forward fix from the front of the engine or does the whole bl00dy crank have to be removed? While I am at it, are there any other parts I should replace regardless (besides the whole car)?

I finally sorted the blinkers/indicators. The relay clatter that stops the engine when the blinkers were turned-on turned out to be the hazard light switch. By unplugging the big red hazard light switch and hit wiring pins 4 and 5 of the bottom row of pins in the socket where the hazard switch came from, the blinkers will work normally. Saves spending $400 AUD on a new hazard switch.

Woops what's that noise??? Oh the rear diff torque mounting bracket bush has failed again. That's cheap, only another $150 AUD (75 quid in Pommy language)

Click to expand...

A little off topic but this could be due to the current draw on a faulty ignition switch.

I am posting this reply as I have had first hand experience with this problem.
The crank pulley assembly consists of three parts which are supplied as one component. The outer section is a ring which forms the pulley and drives the auxiliary belt. The outer ring is machined and fits over the central part which bolts onto the crankshaft. These two metal parts are designed to rotate about their axes limited by a two metal stops. The third part of the assembly is a vulcanized rubber buffer which is bonded to the two metal parts and further restricts relative movement between the metal parts. When the rubber deteriorates more and more movement between the metal parts takes place.
A knocking noise is caused by the stops mentioned above knocking against each other. The rattling noise is caused by the outer ring or pulley slapping against the inner part. When this happens the rubber has almost completely disintegrated. If you continue using the vehicle after this point the metal stops wear away and the pulley will stop turning as the crank continues to spin.

I am posting this reply as I have had first hand experience with this problem.
The crank pulley assembly consists of three parts which are supplied as one component. The outer section is a ring which forms the pulley and drives the auxiliary belt. The outer ring is machined and fits over the central part which bolts onto the crankshaft. These two metal parts are designed to rotate about their axes limited by a two metal stops. The third part of the assembly is a vulcanized rubber buffer which is bonded to the two metal parts and further restricts relative movement between the metal parts. When the rubber deteriorates more and more movement between the metal parts takes place.
A knocking noise is caused by the stops mentioned above knocking against each other. The rattling noise is caused by the outer ring or pulley slapping against the inner part. When this happens the rubber has almost completely disintegrated. If you continue using the vehicle after this point the metal stops wear away and the pulley will stop turning as the crank continues to spin.

I am posting this reply as I have had first hand experience with this problem.
The crank pulley assembly consists of three parts which are supplied as one component. The outer section is a ring which forms the pulley and drives the auxiliary belt. The outer ring is machined with a bronze bush finish and fits over the central part which bolts onto the crankshaft. These two metal parts are designed to rotate about their axes limited by a two metal stops. Movement between the two parts produces a powdery carbon bronze residue. The third part of the assembly is a vulcanized rubber buffer which is bonded to the two metal parts and further restricts relative movement between the metal parts. When the rubber deteriorates more and more movement between the metal parts takes place.
A knocking noise is caused by the stops mentioned above knocking against each other. The rattling noise is caused by the outer ring or pulley slapping against the inner part. When this happens the rubber has almost completely disintegrated. If you continue using the vehicle after this point the metal stops wear away and the pulley will stop turning as the crank continues to spin.

Mark2 said:

Update:-

That pulley is vibration damped.
Local independant said they had never known one fail (heard that before) but it is supposed to have relative movement and may be loose or breaking up.

The centre bolt holds it against the timing chain pully over a woodruff key on the crank. They reckon checking if it is indeed loose - but to tighten it you have to lock the engine by removing the starter and wedging a a large flat bladed screwdriver in the flywheel - no job is ever easy !

Gets worse:-

The pully costs £195 inc VAT


Will do some more investigation.

Click to expand...

did mine last year, exactly the same noises and dust. 15 min job with an air gun. 99 quid for pulley off the bay of E. no problem since. it can and does fail, so independent is not correct. it does need a stage torque up as per haynes manual.

comes with woodruff key, although some of us on here have deduced that its not required if you didnt have one in the first place, search for thread. comes with new stretch bolt too. dont reuse old one. Get a new belt tensioner too whilst its all off, couple a quid extra but saves doing it again soon.

oops see you already parted with the cash!! glad its done, but bloody hell thats a lot of wonga.

Hi all,

My engine making similar noise, however Haynes Manual says you have to align the valve timing marks before you can take the pulley off, can't see why and maybe interpreting it wrong.

Help?

Keith

Hey there unfortunate Td4 owners.

I have had the crank pulley fail about every 100,000Km. Better this fails than the crank shaft. The noise sounds like you have dropped a main engine bearing. Not a good idea to drive in case it does more damage. The drive belts pull in opposite directions so they tend to stay on. If you rev the engine or drive over 20Km/hr the noise usually reduces.

The pulley is, as others have said, designed to help align the drive belts with the crank shaft and also to reduce vibration. Also damps some shock to the engine when the air con compressor switches on.

straight forward fix. Jack car and make safe from rolling/falling, remove right front wheel, remove the wheel arch lower mud shield, now with crank pulley and its HUGE bolt exposed, get a dirty thumping great big pneumatic wrench and a tight fitting socket. I left the drive belts tensioned to add resistance for removing bolt. I had no trouble getting it off without needing to stick screw drivers in the flywheel. If someone has used Loctite, you may need heat to get it to move. That's heat, not a steel cutting oxy-acetylene. Try a gas stove lighter - when it burns your finger, it's warm.

There are two serpentine drive belts. Under the crank pulley is a tensioning roller. Loosen the smaller nut and the tension roller should drop a bit, and you move it further by placing a socket over the larger bolt and rotating as required.

The upper belt tensioner was designed by a (rood word) with no knowledge of usability or mechanical ergonomics. There is very little clearance to get anything in so I had to buy a 400mm long flat ring spanner with a the semi socket sticking out about 10mm from the main spanner shaft. Place the spanner over the tensioning roller bolt that is located above the crank pulley between the chasis and the tensioner. It is heavily spring loaded. Pull toward the front of the car (anticlockwise turn) against the spring and hold while you remove the drive belt from the steering pump. eep your finters out from under the belt because of the spanner slips... squashy finger. I recommend having a helper for this part of the job. You will also need good light.

Check the pattern of the belts so you can put it back the same way and then remove them. Now pull off the crank pulley. It is heavy any may be in two parts due to the rubber failure so be careful of your feet. Although there is a groove in the pulley and you think there must be a Woodrough key, there isn't. The key is further back under the timing belt sprocket. The crank pulley relies on bolt tension only. Manual says replace the bolt as reuse has fatigue crack issues. Bolt is cheap ($11AUD)

Check the front crank shaft seal. Mine was still OK after the 3rd crank pulley - if it is OK I suggest leave it because there are issues replacing it. The manual says it has to be put in place FROM THE INSIDE. The trouble is that the flap on the seal screws-up trying to put it directly on the shaft. I helped replace on from the outside by cutting a coke can into a rectangle and rolling it in a cylinder to act as a guide. A fiddle but it worked. Be careful not to push it in too far; it needs to sit flush with the outside or it will rub on the crank pulley.

Re-assembly is reverse of the above. New crank pulley was $330AUD aftermarket; twice that from the thieving original parts executives - don't blame the poor guys who work at the parts counter.

Be careful of your fingers putting the top drive belt back on and tell any children to stay away as they may learn a whole new language that mum wont like