Crakshaft Pulley Final Chapter

I love the Miata but I have to be honest; it's the most unreliable car I have ever owned.  Since September 2007, that's just over 5 years, it really has only worked right for a couple of months, in 2009. The rest of the time the crankshaft pulley was screwed up screwing up the timing, or the brakes were seized or it was over heating or something other. Yet I still love it.  I love driving it.  Those couple of months in 2009 were awesome.


And it was in December of 2009 that the Miata finally went under the tarp with a totally screwed up Crankshaft.  It hasn't been driven since.  It's been started and it clanked and clattered for a few minutes but it basically just sat for over 2years completely broken.  I almost sold the car last year. I got offered $1000 to sell it as is.  But I thought no;  selling the car would be giving up and I'd always regret it.  However I don't want the car to sit in the garage endlessly waiting for me to get my shit together to fix it. So finally after two long years when the opportunity presented itself I went out and bought a new engine. A 92 so it has the redesigned long nose crankshaft pulley and timing gear. This is what it looks like.

That's it lying on the floor of my garage.  Now ironically it came without the crankcase pulley so I had to get a new one but there it is. It took about four whole days of working with my dad to pull the defunct engine out and put the new one in.  It actually took 3 weeks but most of that time was waiting for parts to be delivered. 

Dad under and me over unhooking and unscrewing.  The bolts to the bell housing were tight.

hoodless

Starting to lift it out.  The engine and transmission didn't want to separate,  I had to give it a big yank and it went.  It's kinda scary cause the engine weighs a lot and if it falls it will damage stuff.  

Proud papa.  It's a 1.6l! 

I didn't get into the empty bay and take the obligatory guy stands in empty engine bay shot.  But I might tomorrow. 

Day 2 we've stripped the old one of any missing bits from the new one and any bits we want to keep for the future.

Old engine fully stripped.  

The redesigned sprocket awaiting a new pulley and bolt. 

The old timing sprocket. It's all loose in there and you can jiggle it back and forth.

Day 3 was spent putting on all the bits we stripped from the old engine onto the new one and Day 4 was all about fighting to put the new engine back in the bay and finally it was the moment of truth...

After a while oil got to the lifters and that clanking stopped as did the fire, it was just grease on the exhaust manifold.  It's been problem free motoring since then and I must say I will remember this as a really special and wonderful thing I got to do with my pops. Just another way cars make life better.