95 BUICK RIVIERA/Super Charge

[hotrod4jesus]

Hey I need to replace my Harmonic Balancer on my B/R. 95 S/C
do I have to take out my motor in order to do that ??? or NO

sure hope not
Thanks for all that reply

[scoopy03]

Originally Posted by hotrod4jesus

Hey I need to replace my Harmonic Balancer on my B/R. 95 S/C
do I have to take out my motor in order to do that ??? or NO

sure hope not
Thanks for all that reply

you just need a pulley puller and a prybar and it will come off. take the belts of it put the pulley puller or on it and twist the puller and it should start to slide off use a prybar gently and it should come off no problem. putting it back on just use a good hammer/mallet.

[96riviera18]

you can acess the crank pulley from the fender there is no need to pull then engine unless you are droping in a new cam too.
the hardest part is taking out the crank bolt (something like 400lbs force required), pulling the balancer off is just time consuming, and it helps to use the bolt as a press point when pulling so you dont damage anything. you dont need to use a hammer to force it back on. it should slide on enough to get the TTY bolt started, and you may want to replace your CKP sensor while you are in there, it seems to be a semi common problem with the 3800 engines. (shouldnt be more than $20 for the sensor and it will save you headach later if it does go bad) and you can get the puller at autozone for free (rental) but make sure it is the right one since our engines have 2 belts on the balancer and it is longer than most.

[ralfwho]

OK, here is my tale of woe, hopeully someone else will learn from my trials.
Last summer, the engine of my SC Riv 3.8 with 140k miles started making a terrible noise from the general area of the timing gear. So off came the belt tensioning assembly, water pump, and harmonic balancer. Whoa! One DISINTEGRATED harmonic balancer! The rubber that held the two pieces together had shredded and there was about 30 degrees of play between the timing tabs and the hub. I replaced it with a DORMAN (made-in-China) balancer for about $100. Replaced the timing chain, gear, and water pump, as long as I was there. Not a difficult job, just a bit annoying because of the stuff you have to move to get to the bare front cover.
Car ran great, for exactly 405 miles.
Limped home one night and as I creeped up the driveway, it started spewing oil out the front seal all over the place. "This ain't good" I thought. Three months of miserable cold weather and the Riv had to sit on the driveway until three weeks ago when I put together enough will to see what happened.
The answer was pretty quick in coming. When I took off the balancer (remember, made in China for $100) it came out in two chunks. Seems that the hub had fractured at the keyway and this was the cause, I figured, for the "running like crap". The splintered hub must've taken the front seal with it, causing the oil hemorrage. Off came the front cover (in order to replace the front seal) and just for the hell of it I took a real good look at the oil pump, which on the 3800 is driven by the crank, just behind where the balancer sits. Good thing I did. The housing was cracked from the balancer failure and this is where I was losing oil.
I took the balancer back to Lee Auto in Arlington Heights IL and told them my tale. They took the old balancer and gave me a new one, with no questions. Just for the hell of it, I took the new balancer to my machine shop of choice and this is the purpose for my rant.

The NEW BALANCER WAS DEFECTIVE!!!!!!!!!

Seems my machine shop guy Joe teaches at a local jr college and mentioned that the Dorman guy told him these things are failing left and right. So we checked the new one very closely. Not only was the keyway cut too wide, it was cut too shallow on one end; torquing this one on the crankshaft was sure to fracture the hub. Most likely this is what happened to my first replacement balancer - it started to fail as soon as I installed it.

One might be quick to label all stuff from China as crap and I'm not sure I would argue that. Certainly I will never go the cheap route on a mission-critical part again.

Perhaps the better lesson is to very carefully inspect (maybe a better word would be MEASURE) mission-critical parts.

[misternh]

Originally Posted by 96riviera18

you can acess the crank pulley from the fender there is no need to pull then engine unless you are droping in a new cam too.
the hardest part is taking out the crank bolt (something like 400lbs force required), pulling the balancer off is just time consuming, and it helps to use the bolt as a press point when pulling so you dont damage anything. you dont need to use a hammer to force it back on. it should slide on enough to get the TTY bolt started, and you may want to replace your CKP sensor while you are in there, it seems to be a semi common problem with the 3800 engines. (shouldnt be more than $20 for the sensor and it will save you headach later if it does go bad) and you can get the puller at autozone for free (rental) but make sure it is the right one since our engines have 2 belts on the balancer and it is longer than most.

ive changed mine three times already ,and it's acually not bad to do .
first jack up the car ,remove the pass side wheel,now remove some of the plastic inner wheel caseing and peal it back some ,there you have a great view of the balancer install the puller from here ,and you can install the balancer from here as well.easy to use impact wrench from here as well with short extension .takes me twenty min,from start to finish

[superfiero]

Can anyone tell me if the crankshaft pulley bolt in the center of the pulley is a regular threaded bolt or reverse thread. I am having one heck of a time trying to remove it and I don't want to tighten any more.

[HotZ28]

Originally Posted by superfiero

Can anyone tell me if the crankshaft pulley bolt in the center of the pulley is a regular threaded bolt or reverse thread. I am having one heck of a time trying to remove it and I don't want to tighten any more.

It is a standard 'right-hand thread' and turns counterclockwise to loosen. Best to use a high quality impact wrench capable of 350+ ft lbs of torque.