Spannerhead Dot Com

Nori’s inner (PS and WP) drive belt was showing some cracking, so I decided to replace.

Unfortunately, the adjuster pulley bolt broke in the process of loosening it.

Fortunately, I was able to remove Megumi’s and swap it over. Thank goodness for parts cars.

It’s an interesting contraption. Regular threads on the bottom, reverse threads on the “shuttle” part up top.


If I had to do the job over again, I would:

1. Don’t even touch the pulley, but cut the drive belt (wearing eye protection and gloves)
2. Remove the pulley completely
3. Back the bolt off enough to remove the “shuttle” out from behind the bracket
4. Remove the bolt
5. Clean/chase and lube all threads
6. Reinstall

Since I finished ahead of schedule this afternoon, I was able to polish up the headlights also, with the same kit I used for Megumi last fall.

Before:

Gouged his eyes out (temporarily):

The kit:

And…done:

So today, on the passenger side, I actually did have to replace the CV axle itself, since Megumi’s inner boot had a small tear:

So, I chopped it in half…

…and used Megumi as a jig to hold the hub to allow me to remove the nut:

Came off no problem with PB, heat and a cheater bar.

I didn’t manage to fully “de-stake” either nut, but was able to move the flange just enough so that they broke free:

I had to drop the front of the exhaust to be able to get the angle I needed to knock the inner joint free:

Megumi’s front hub and strut in place:

And all buttoned up with new CV axle:

I also remembered to mark the front pulley for future reference:

Never hurts to make that little dent more obvious.

So…Nori drives PERFECTLY now. The juddering in 2nd and 3rd is totally gone, as is the lash in the driveline and clunks from the front suspension. He’s just a magic carpet ride of little Mazda V6 smoothness and a sweet shifting 5-speed.

Still a host of little issues to sort out, but all in all, a very satisfying weekend’s work.

The cold chisel trick worked a treat to separate the inner joint from the transmission. All the other bolts fought me. Even the cotter pin on the tie rod end was a pain to remove (I didn’t rip the boot though—score), and I had to take huge swings with the sledge at the hub-to-strut bolts, even after using heat & penetrant. The control arm’s balljoint boot tore, but that was the only “casualty” of the whole process. I’ll replace both some weekend soon.

I didn’t separate Megumi’s hub & axle, but set the hub down on the control arm balljoint, inserted the inner joint into the trans and pivoted the hub in toward the car. The inner joint clicked into place—success.

From there, getting everything buttoned up was easy, and I put all the gear oil back in the transaxle and the splash shield back on.

Passenger side tomorrow.

35% (the legal limit here in TN).

Gotta keep the interior plastics & leathers happy over the summer… And the occupant(s) too I suppose.

Managed to separate the passenger side tie rod without tearing the balljoint boot. We’ll see if I can do that twice on Nori’s hubs.

Latest glamour shot without the mudguards.

He got a good wash last night, and I waxed the hood, roof and trunklid.

Also replaced the transaxle oil. A bit dirtier than Megumi’s transaxle, but the drain and fill bolts came off just fine:

A decent amount came out, and it didn’t look too dirty, so I guess it had been done before.

In not-so-great news, I also discovered this:

which would help explain some lash in the driveline and potentially some vibrations felt in certain regimes. I guess I know what I’ll be doing this (long) weekend…

First, I did a deep clean of the carpet so it had time to air-dry. Before:

(apparently, the previous owner was a real sunflower seed enthusiast; they were embedded everywhere)

Cleaning supplies:

And after:

Doesn’t look a whole lot cleaner, but it is, and more importantly, it just SMELLS better.

Got the door sills all nice and clean from the Canadian/Floridian environments. Before:

After:

I swapped over a bunch of Megumi’s interior plastics like the center console trim & armrest storage BUT I kept Nori’s lid, since it has a soft-close hinge (Megumi’s always slammed and felt cheap).

And finally, I cleaned up the door jambs and swapped over known good door stays. Before:

And after:

It’s really nice to have a door that stays open properly now.

I was on the fence about swapping over the shift knob I bought right before the accident. I kind of wanted to wait until I swapped Megumi’s engine and trans in, but…in the end I just did it. I never did drive Megumi with the new knob, so it’ll be a fun commute tomorrow morning.

Swapped over Megumi’s rebuilt power antenna. Of course, they didn’t take the 3 minutes to remove the antenna before the respray:

That’s like not removing switch plates before you repaint a room. Makes my skin crawl.

In any case, the antenna was a quick swap over and works well.

I also swapped the glove box door, since Nori’s was missing a screw and the latch rattled (and it was just dirty).

Finally removed the giant “Group B” mudguards and installed Megumi’s subtle “fender protectors” on the front. Comparison:

On Nori:

And before:

And after:

It’s a subtle difference, but I think he looks 1000X better. So much sleeker and more cohesive. The mudguards just stopped the front-to-rear visual flow in its tracks. Now he looks all-of-a-piece.