Ok,
Some of you may know from a post of mine a couple of weeks ago that I stripped the teeth off the duke's cam gear. I found a GM TSB that stated the gear can be removed without removing the camshaft by drilling holes in the cam gear and using a puller. Last night I started the work and the method I used was actually much easier than the new TSB states.
I actually was able to get to the cam gear in about 2 hours unhooking and disconnecting much less than the service bulletin suggested. Here's what I did:
Remove the following:
-Trunklid (not 100% necessary but makes it easier to work)
-Battery cover
-Disconnect battery connections
-Ground strap to engine
-Air cleaner
-Dogbone
-both accessory belts
-Throttle body and linkage. You don't have to remove the cable, linkages and fuel lines from the throttle body, the idea is to remove the these parts so when you lower the cradle the throttle body and linkage doesn't hit the trunk wall. This is not part of the TSB but taking this off saves taking off a lot of other stuff and makes the job much faster.
-Remove the clamp holding the coolant line going under the intake manifold. the clamp is on the trunk bulkhead, near the passenger strut tower.
Jack up the rear, place jack stands under the rear frame, NOT the cradle. I used jack stands with a piece of 2" x 2" steel tubing on top to get a little more height. Chock the front wheels!
Connect a hoist to the engine and place some tension on the chain.
-remove the rear wheels
-Remove the e-brake cable bracket on the driver side wheel well
-Remove the bracket for the brake hose on both side wheel wells
-Remove the 3 bolts on each strut holding the strut to the tower.
Revove the inner wheel well on the passenger side.
-Remove the two rear cradle bolts.

Lower the hoist and the rear of the cradle will drop down. You should be able to get the cradle all the way down to the ground and have enough room to remove the cam cover and work on the gear.

You should check very carefully as you lower the cradle that no hoses, cables or wires are getting stressed. I didn't have any problems with this: I didn't even have to remove any hoses or drain any antifreeze.

The TSB instructions call for you to remove all four cradle bolts and completely drop the cradle out, drain the coolant and take off a bunch of other stuff, including removing the struts from the knuckles. This way saved a lot of time. I just thought someone might find this useful and bookmark it. I've gotten a lot of good advice from this forum over the years, thought I'd try to share some of mine.

So...after taking off the cam cover, there it was, four or five teeth missing off the cam gear. I will post more about drilling the camshaft and gear to remove and replace it as I go.

Tony

[This message has been edited by TONY_C (edited 11-11-2008).]

Yeah, it kind of stinks... but almost all 4 cyl Fieros are going through this at this point now... it's just the age I guess...

------------------
Todd,
2006 Pontiac Solstice
2004 Volkswagen Beetle Convt. (Wife's)
2002 Ford Crown Victoria LX
1987 Pontiac Fiero SE / V6
1981 EZ-GO Xi875-A "Miami Dolphins" Medical Cart
1973 Volkswagen Type-2 Transporter
1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme 350

What really stinks about the whole thing is that I got an all steel gear for a replacement for $13. Seems like the cheap parts always take hours to replace. I just figured that since a lot of Dukes are going to need this done, it would be a good idea to post it to try and save some time doing it. It really was so much simpler than the TSB made it out to be. Friday I plan to drill the old gear and pull it off. I post more about that when I finish it.

Well, getting the old gear off is easy, but putting the new one on is a pain. I have a special tool that was created to do this with the engine still in the car. It works, but... it would probably be easier to just pull the cam out and press the bearing on. Why didn't GM just use two bolts to hold it on? Sigh...

J.

quote Originally posted by jaskispyder: Well, getting the old gear off is easy, but putting the new one on is a pain. I have a special tool that was created to do this with the engine still in the car. It works, but... it would probably be easier to just pull the cam out and press the bearing on. Why didn't GM just use two bolts to hold it on? Sigh... J.

According to the TSB, a 3/8-16 tapped hole is required. You drill and tap the center of the cam and use a bolt to pull it on. Is this correct or am I missing something? What is the tool you are talking about?

I am fearing this will be my next job, so I have a question. Couldn't you get at everything through the wheel well on tha passenger side? Seems way easier than dropping the craddle. I have never done this so I don't know.

That is pretty much the tool... just everything in one package (a Fiero owner through it together).

My problem is that the metal gear wouldn't go on without tapping it as I turned the bolt.

J.

[This message has been edited by jaskispyder (edited 11-12-2008).]

quote Originally posted by Curlrup: I am fearing this will be my next job, so I have a question. Couldn't you get at everything through the wheel well on tha passenger side? Seems way easier than dropping the craddle. I have never done this so I don't know.

No, you can not get to the timing gear cover without dropping the cradle. Well, I suppose it would be possible to unbolt it but there is just no way to get a puller on the gear without lowering the engine. Believe me though, it really wasn't that much work to lower the cradle. Of course, I was kinda lucky in that the rear cradle bolts came out very easily, I didn't even have to spray them with PB Blaster to get them loose. The main thing to remember is to just get the rear of the car high enough so that when you lower the cradle the engine goes low enough. I will take some pics later this week and post them.

Just an update to let anyone interested know how the cam gear replacement went. It was a lot easier than I expected. I did not have to drill the center hole for the cam, it was already center drilled, probably for manufacturing purposes. It was the proper size for a 3/8-16 tap so I just used a bottom tap to get as many threads as possible. From my previous posts, I had the engine all ready to replace the gear. I drilled 2 #7 drill holes 180* apart on the cam hub and then tapped the holes for 1/4-20 screws. I used a steering wheel puller to remove the old gear. It came off pretty easily. To install the new gear, I aligned the timing marks and started it onto the cam with a couple of gentle taps from a mallet and then I used a pulley installer, similar to the types used to install power steering pulleys, onto the cam. All in all, the cam removal and installation was the easiest part of the whole job.

http://home.comcast.net/~fierocave/

Maryjane,
I know there is an article in the Cave about this but I decided to post my experiences with this because Ogre says in the Cave that he didn't actually do the cam replacement this way, only that he has heard it can be done.

Here is another good write up that I used. Did this in a parking lot on Memorial Day. Not fun.
//www.fiero.nl/forum/A...020825-2-018751.html

quote Originally posted by Hudini: Here is another good write up that I used. Did this in a parking lot on Memorial Day. Not fun. //www.fiero.nl/forum/A...020825-2-018751.html

Yes, that's a good write up. fortunately, my cam gear wasn't missing half of it's teeth like the one in that thread. I was only missing 4 teeth. My engine only has 80K on it, I think it was more due to age than actual wear.