Sorry, I cannot find a forum about my vehicle, '96 Nissan Quest, that has much tech knowledge.
I am trying to replace the timing belt but cannot get the crank pulley off. The bolt is off already. The pulley has two 5mm threaded holes. I tried two 5mm metric bolts and my harmonic balancer puller. But the 5mm bolts just strip the threads of the crank pulley.
Anyone else have this problem? Thanks.

 

I think your only suppost to loosen the timing belt idler pulley bolt (the one without gears/teeths on it), the one to the upper left of the camshaft sprocket, to remove the timing belt. I could be wrong, but thats what I recall doing a couple weeks ago on dads VG. Im not sure if its the same procedure, but they are a similar engine so it might work for you.

 

use a gear puller or just work at it as gently as possible with a crowbar and some lube. stick and wiggle the bar between the oil pan and pully, alternating from both sides. mine seemed to be stuck very tight but came right off very easially..course this was after i spent some time doing what i just described. good luck, this is one of the more annoying parts of the job if you don't have a gear puller. don't tighten your belt too tight man, somewhere in the stickies there's documentation about crankshafts breaking if your belts are too tight on a vg.

 

just get a pulley pulley from a place like autozone. i know autozone has a deal to where you basically rent it for free (pay a certain price for the pulley and you get your money right back when you bring the tool back).

a puller like this:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...temnumber=8856

 

I use a regular 2 or 3 jaw puller to remove it. make sure you grab onto the thick part of the belt guides. If you get one of the thin ribs, they can bend or break and damage the belts if you use the pulley again.

Also spray some penetrating lube like Kroil or PB Blaster around the end of the crankshaft.

Also, put the bolt on the crank back in, but don't thread it all the way in. that will give your puller something to push against. what I do is put the bolt in it and stick a wrench on it to keep from turning, then put the puller over those two and start pulling.


The problem with the pulley getting stuck is because the end of the shaft will get slightly rusted and the pulley won't want to come off... once you finally DO get it off, be sure to hit it very lightly with some fine sandpaper (like 400 grit) to just smooth off the surface and remove the rust.

You're also going to have one helluva time getting the timing gear off the crank. that has got to be one of the worst hassles I've ever had..
I highly suggest buying another gear from the dealer (They're about $35), and throwing the old one away.. most of the time it's destroyed by the time you get it off.

what I finally ended up doing on my last T belt job was drilling and tapping a few 1/4" holes in the gear and using a steering wheel puller to remove it.

it's a PITA, but it's possible. good luck.

 

I don't think there is room for a 3 jaw puller.

I did get the pulley off at last. I had tried a harmonic balancer puller tool that looks somewhat like this:
http://store.yahoo.com/bradystools/lisharbalinp.html

But the threads on the pulley had stripped.

Had to spend hours drilling out the original pulley holes and tapping new threads that matched the bolts that came with my harmonic balancer puller tool. Worked fine with the new bolt threads.
Good hint about drilling holes in the crank sproket. I may need to do that next.

In my limited experience on a Mitsubishi 3Liter, the crank pulley and crank sprocket do not need a puller to remove them because they are not very tight.

Thanks.

 

heh.. yeah, well that's $hitsubishi for you.
the Maxima ones will slide right on/off if the crank is clean with no corrosion. a little bit of anti-sieze or axle grease on the parts is highly recommended before reinstall.