Hot Diggety!
Thread Starter
Burning Brakes
Joined: Feb 2000
Posts: 1,247
Likes: 2
From: Parker, Colorado, USofA
Hot Diggety!
I'm not too proud to admit I have a problem. I have an obsessive compulsive disorder.
While some folks exhibit symptoms by washing their hands, and others fixate on minutiae, my compulsion centers around the mechanical aspects of the Sled.
Now that the motor's in and running like a champ, the laundry list of things to do are shrinking significantly. The parts have dwindled, the bolt have homes, and the monthly Visa bill has fewer and fewer entries in it (Tho' still a hefty balance, to be sure.)
The major problem left was a noise that exhibited itself when the motor was cold for a second or two...then when the cold vehicle's tranny was held back in first or second gear...it didn't show up in D or OD.
It sounded like an accessory belt noise. I ended up replaceing an alternator (that genuinely failed). That didn't fix it.
I remember using some washers to get the accessory bracket bolts to torque down. Reengineered that, didn't fix it.
I replaced the belt. Didn't do it.
Ordered a new tensioner (to replace the original) and really didn't look forward to replaceing it, as a modified radiator hose (with metal insert and two hoseclamps in the vicinity) vie for the same place.
Listening to the motor I _could_not_ isolate the sound using my screwdriver-stethoscope and it was really bugging me.
I wondered if it was located elsewhere, perhaps the driver side header (which contacts the tranny tunnel occasionally) was rubbing, causing the sound....I get the car back up in the air, let it get cold, then carefully crawl under the lift to listen as my wife manned (womanned? helmed!) the controls.
MAN there's a lot of sound under there when the car's running!
Long story short, the flexplate cover that I 'relieved' to clear the 14" flexplate wasn't relieved enough. While there was enough space for the flexplate to spin normally, while under load it must have moved juuuust enough for the flexplate to contact the cover. Picture what a toothed spinning thing rubbing up against a sheet steel thing would sound like.
Never has the LACK of a sound sounded so good! :D
The Sled will be coverless until gmpartsdirect can ship me a $15 flexplate cover. One more entry on that Visa.
While some folks exhibit symptoms by washing their hands, and others fixate on minutiae, my compulsion centers around the mechanical aspects of the Sled.
Now that the motor's in and running like a champ, the laundry list of things to do are shrinking significantly. The parts have dwindled, the bolt have homes, and the monthly Visa bill has fewer and fewer entries in it (Tho' still a hefty balance, to be sure.)
The major problem left was a noise that exhibited itself when the motor was cold for a second or two...then when the cold vehicle's tranny was held back in first or second gear...it didn't show up in D or OD.
It sounded like an accessory belt noise. I ended up replaceing an alternator (that genuinely failed). That didn't fix it.
I remember using some washers to get the accessory bracket bolts to torque down. Reengineered that, didn't fix it.
I replaced the belt. Didn't do it.
Ordered a new tensioner (to replace the original) and really didn't look forward to replaceing it, as a modified radiator hose (with metal insert and two hoseclamps in the vicinity) vie for the same place.
Listening to the motor I _could_not_ isolate the sound using my screwdriver-stethoscope and it was really bugging me.
I wondered if it was located elsewhere, perhaps the driver side header (which contacts the tranny tunnel occasionally) was rubbing, causing the sound....I get the car back up in the air, let it get cold, then carefully crawl under the lift to listen as my wife manned (womanned? helmed!) the controls.
MAN there's a lot of sound under there when the car's running!
Long story short, the flexplate cover that I 'relieved' to clear the 14" flexplate wasn't relieved enough. While there was enough space for the flexplate to spin normally, while under load it must have moved juuuust enough for the flexplate to contact the cover. Picture what a toothed spinning thing rubbing up against a sheet steel thing would sound like.
Never has the LACK of a sound sounded so good! :D
The Sled will be coverless until gmpartsdirect can ship me a $15 flexplate cover. One more entry on that Visa.
