Harmonic Balance Pulley Options

[onesickgst32]

about a year ago i heard a loud knocking noise near the bottom of my engine and come to find out the harmonic balance pulley had broken and was bouncing back and forth making the knocking noise. well i took it to a mechanic friend of mine and he replaced it with a lifetime warranty.

well a few months later it broke again. same thing happened. the rubber in the middle completely separated. once again we replaced it. he was kind of shocked that it broke again so soon.

well last week, which was almost a year since it broke last, started to do it again and i looked and there was that dang pulley, bounicng back and forth like it was going to fly off.

i took it back to him and he decided we should get a mitsu pulley instead of a generic aftermarket. hopefully the mitsu one is stronger.

this pulley runs a belt to the AC compressor. my air doesnt work at idle. only at higher rpm's over 2k. i am wondering if the Compressor is bad. that would explain the broken pullyey and the sketchy air. i had a full AC check done and the freon is fine as are the other components such as the evaporator and dryer. so chances are this compressor is the cause. the reason i think this is because i hadnt used AC all winter and a few weeks ago i used it on a 200 mile trip to alabama and back for the first time since it was fixed last.

has anyone else ever had this problem before?

[TrevorS]

I can only say that while researching a lightweight crank pulley, I read the aftermarket vibration isolators ("harmonic balancer"s) are indeed junk. You have to get the Mitsubishi pulley. I'm currently on my second, the first lasted about 110K.

[19talon92]

i wouldn't use those after market lightweight pulleys...seen and heard alot of bad things from those =/

[TrevorS]

i wouldn't use those after market lightweight pulleys...seen and heard alot of bad things from those =/

The only ones I found for the 1G were underdrive, and that's definitely not for me. There's lots of misinformation floating about regarding "harmonic balancers" and lightweight pulley's, but suitability depends on both the pulley and the engine -- hence my researching (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) !

[NWM_Tech]

this pulley runs a belt to the AC compressor. my air doesnt work at idle. only at higher rpm's over 2k. i am wondering if the Compressor is bad. that would explain the broken pullyey and the sketchy air.

Bad AC compressor shouldn't affect the crank pulley.

About the only thing that can is overtightened drive belts, or the crank bolt undertightened or overtightened. Under tight it obviously just comes loose, over tight and the bolt stretches and breaks.

overtightened belts can cause pulley fail and broken cranks on some models.

[onesickgst32]

I can only say that while researching a lightweight crank pulley, I read the aftermarket vibration isolators ("harmonic balancer"s) are indeed junk. You have to get the Mitsubishi pulley. I'm currently on my second, the first lasted about 110K.

i went through 2 of those so this time i did get the mitsubishi pulley. and so far its worked fine. thanks for the info