Rylan

Would a good quality electric impact gun do the trick?

lostforawhile

you may have to get the tool, sometimes there's simply no way around it, you may get it off eventually, but you will spend far more time and go through much more frustration trying to do it the wrong way. If you need to get the thing, think of it as an investment, the next time you need it, you've got it, or if you don't want to keep it, sell it on egay and get most of your money back

Rylan

Im trying to torque it on there, not take it off. lol Once it's on there it will be on there to stay.

Rylan

I am borrowing an electric impact gun to get it on there. Hopefully that works.

itsnotfast

It probably fell out because some idiot didnt tighten it because they couldn't figure out how to do it without the engine spinning. These aren't head bolts. While I'm sure there is a little stretching going on I have never ever replaced a crank pulley bolt. I have taken hundreds of them off and back on. All I have ever done is use an impact gun. Out of all the crank pulley bolts I have done, I have only ever broken one. The one that broke did so while trying to take it off.

itsnotfast

I use a MAC 1/2 drive impact gun and it has never failed me.

strategy400

I'd be surprised if your crank snout isn't hosed. Did you find the pulley key?

I'm also shocked that people are being careless ramming a bolt into the end of their crankshaft with an impact gun.

I've always used a torque wrench and torqued the same old bolt to the specification. Never had a problem and I drive the crap out of my car. Everytime I loosen it later it is tight as crap.

I made a custom tool to hold the pulley (I have the one with the holes) from an old piece of bed frame (really it's just a solid piece of angle iron) with a hole drilled in it. It works for loosening and tightening (loosening shown).



Trick is to tighten the angle iron up tight/flush to the pulley. Also, support the head of the breaker bar with something so you can get square torque on the bolt.

Rylan

Awesome, thank you for your reply. My brother doesn't have his new air compressor set up yet. So all I have available to me is a Makita electric impact gun. He said it's got quite a bit of torque to it. Im sure it should work fine. Thank you for letting me know about not worrying about replacing the bolt due to stretching.

That tool is crafty, It holds it well? I don't have any flat bar kicking around though.

Rylan

I didn't find the key, but I installed a brand new key. That method would work for loosening the bolt, but I guess for tightening you would just reverse the flat bar so it will drive into the ground on the other side huh?

itsnotfast

Your showing him how to take it off not put it on. I know the same basic concept of what your showing him applies to tightening, but you need to also specify that he cannot use 2 feet of extensins when torquing weather it be with a torque wrench or with an impact gun. There is nothing wrong with using an impact gun on it.

lostforawhile

I guess Honda developed the new bolts and came up with the new torque specifications for kicks? there's a reason there is a specific procedure and torque spec, and crank bolts very much do stretch, head bolts aren't the only thing that do, if the manufacturer says a specific bolts is required to be replaced, there's a reason, and it's not to sell you a bolt

Rylan

Stupid Question, why can't your use extensions while torquing

lostforawhile

you mean I spent all this money on snap on torque wrenches, and I could have just torqued the crap out of everything with an impact wrench? I feel stupid now, it's all a conspiracy of the tool manufacturers

lostforawhile

the extensions twist and don't give you the true torque as to what the wrench is saying, sometimes you have to use an extension, but use the shortest one you possibly can and figure a couple of extra foot pounds in for the extension

Rylan

Makes complete sense that they twist. Like I have mentioned previously im mostly an electrical guy, not very smart when it comes to engines and components lol

lostforawhile

it's the same reason,that when you are trying to break a tight bolt loose,it's hard to do with a bunch of extensions, but much easier to do with a socket right on the bolt, you loose a lot of the torque through twist. Just do it right, even if it requires borrowing a torque wrench, I build aircraft parts for a living and live by the torque wrench, better to do it right then to mess up your crank

itsnotfast

I'm not saying you're wrong. Yes there is a torque specification and yes it's there for a reason but there is a torque specification on every single bolt on your car down to the ones that hold your dasboard tohether. You cant use impact on everything but your talking about a piece of hardened steel, not aluminum. That bolt will give out long before you'll damage the crank. I never said that a crank bolt doesn't stretch but that it doesn't stretch much.

OP you have had a few very respected people on this site tell you that a torque wrench is not necessary even though it's recommended in the manual and that a decent impact gun will work just fine. As for the extensions, you lose torque do to the twisting in the metal extension. You should never use an extension when torquing a bolt unless you absolutely have to.

Rylan

Yeah those breaker bars are a must have, I gotta pick one up.

Would it be safe to put some lock tight on the threads of the bolt?

lostforawhile

yes there's a torque spec for every bolt on the car, this is one of the more important ones, these are precision engines, not some old domestic POS engine with loose specs on everything, treat them that way and they won't fail you, I just finished fixing the old 5.0 in the Lincoln and it depressing to see how **** poor it was assembled, nice to work on my old Honda out there, why treat these engines the way the domestic engines are put together?

itsnotfast

**** poor assembley? The Ford 5.0 has been in production since 1962. I'd say that they're doing someting right.

lostforawhile

you must not have worked on one for a while, yea they have been around for a while, but there's a lot of bad engineering there, the early ones were probably put together a lot better then some of the newer ones. I don't know why everyone is so against doing things the right way, if you assemble something how long does it take to torque the bolts properly? there are valid reasons for it, EG, oil pan bolts, they don't require much torque, but the reason it's called out, and in a specific pattern, is to make sure all bolts are torqued evenly across the gasket surface, it's not like the pan is going to fall off, but doing it right will prevent a lot of aggravation dealing with leaks. Take some pride in your work, do it right the first time, then you won't have to worry about it later

itsnotfast

You're right 100% but the crank pulley bolt can be put on with a decent impact gun just fine without any issues and this has been stated by others including Honda/Acura technitians. There isn't any worry of having the crank pulley tightened evenly in a certain pattern. It's one bolt that requires a certain torque setting but can be done with an impact gun and tightened close enough to that torque without a torque wrench. Even if you used the above suggested method with angle iron you wont get an acurate torque reading. In order to properly torque the bolt to spec you need the proper crank pulley tool to secure the crank in one place without having any play or give in the metal holding the crank in place. That being said, the OP stated he doesn't have this tool so any attempt of acurately torquing this bolt would be a failure. His best bet would be to use an impact gun.

Rylan

Will the electric impact gun work alright? It's an expensive Makita one.

itsnotfast

I've personally never used one.

itsnotfast

http://hubpages.com/hub/Electric-Imp...-right-for-you

Skim through that then you can make a decision about how you want to tighten the bolt. If you use the electric impact and it comes lose you know you need something more. You don't know anyone with a a decent garage full of tools you could use for a few minutes?