I have some starter problems.... Can I get a little help?

[gatlin04]

well... i told my cousin about it and he basically forced (lol) me to let him help me TRY to fix it..... We got under there for a while yesterday but it got too dark. We were able to push the transmission back a few inches. The flex plate was completely broken off.....

There were 2 bolts in the top that took no force to get off, one more bolt that seemed to be too small, and one more that the head was broken off of. I couldnt believe how loose the bolt were on the trans and torque converter..... LIKE BUTTER....

Its supposed to get cold and snow on sunday, but if it doesn't, we will get out there an try to put the new flex plate in.

It just kills me that if the ol' boy who put it on would have just put some lock tight on it, this possibly would not have happened....Hell, i probably wouldnt have had the opportunity to buy it.....

I guess this is one more thing that people can look for in the future..... lol... i will be te learning curve...****!

 

[Mutant Pony]

There is a piece of the BLOCK missing!!!
The dowels are what aligns the trans with the motor. Replacing the flexplate and bolting it all back together will only result in another broken flexplate.
I don't have a problem with bell housing bolts coming loose and I never use loctite. The biggest problem is not using a torque procedure. If you start by tightening one bolt and working your way around you will end up with bolts falling out.
Any time you have more than one bolt, ON ANYTHING, run all the bolts down snug before you tighten anything. Then use a cross pattern to tighten, repeat. On sheet metal pans use a circular pattern.

That really sucks! If I were closer I would help you out. Good pics by the way.

 

[gatlin04]

There is a piece of the BLOCK missing!!!
The dowels are what aligns the trans with the motor. Replacing the flexplate and bolting it all back together will only result in another broken flexplate.
I don't have a problem with bell housing bolts coming loose and I never use loctite. The biggest problem is not using a torque procedure. If you start by tightening one bolt and working your way around you will end up with bolts falling out.
Any time you have more than one bolt, ON ANYTHING, run all the bolts down snug before you tighten anything. Then use a cross pattern to tighten, repeat. On sheet metal pans use a circular pattern.

That really sucks! If I were closer I would help you out. Good pics by the way.

Ya, i agree, but im stuck in a pretty tight spot right now..... no ride and no cash... I think what im going to do is put the flexplate on and either drive it for a while or dump it at an auction.

We went out there today and slid it back some more and pulled the flexplate completely off.

You can see the damage in the pic... but also what we found out was that there was some sort of adapter or spacer that was in-between the flexplate and the block.... Does anyone know anything about this? We put it back on before the new flexplate.

We were unable to get the trans connected due to not having any kind of jack. I will be borrowing some jacks later this week to help with it.

 

[gatlin04]

There is a piece of the BLOCK missing!!!

I looked at it closer and i observed that there is no other damage other than that piece broken off. There is not any other cracks. It seems like it is just a corner of some sort that is broken off...

 

[gatlin04]

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!

I got the flexplate bolted up and the transmission all the way bolted up. I also got the starter bolted up.

IT STARTED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But i had to turn it off pretty quick because it sounds like the starter is staying engaged.... What should i look do now?

 

[Mutant Pony]

There is a piece of the BLOCK missing! It is one of THE two most important parts of the block! It aligns the trans with the motor. If the motor and trans are out of alignment, so is the starter.
That spacer thingy is supposed to be there.
You could try loosening the bellhousing and starter bolts and moving the bellhousing a little one way or the other (up or down on the side that the block has a piece missing).
You could just try bumping the starter a bunch of times, that will wear it in.

 

[low_five]

mp, dont you think one alignment dowel and the input shaft might keep it half ass aligned?

lol. this is the awesomest ranger repair thread ever. im rooting for this truck.

 

[gatlin04]

mp, dont you think one alignment dowel and the input shaft might keep it half ass aligned?

lol. this is the awesomest ranger repair thread ever. im rooting for this truck.

hahahah thanks bud!

My cousin was CONVINCED that it was the module that is connected to the distributer.... We took that off and had it tested... Obviously nothing was wrong with that. I am a firm believer that i just need to slightly tweek the stater and/or trans.... It doesnt seem to be anything electric... i think that is not aligned properly.

The weather has been pretty shitty lately and i am going to be pretty busy for the next week or so.....

This may be a stupid question.... I took the distributer out to get that module off... but i have not put the distributer back in. Is that a problem to let the truck sit like that?

 

[thegoat4]

Bell housing alignment is important. Without that dowel in there you will break another flex plate and may burn up the TC bushing. Manual trannies are less sensitive, but it still can break the center out of the clutch disk. If you mate the bell housings together and think you've got a good alignment between the two, drill through the bell housings between a couple of bolts and hammer a roll pin or dowel in there to make sure they don't creep back out of alignment. But you are still guessing at alignment and may just pin your bell housings into misalignment.

If you want to repair the truck and make it reliable, replace the broken engine block.

 

[88gt]

If you mate the bell housings together and think you've got a good alignment between the two, drill through the bell housings between a couple of bolts and hammer a roll pin or dowel in there to make sure they don't creep back out of alignment.

doesn't sound like a half bad idea to me given the circumstances

 

[Mutant Pony]

doesn't sound like a half bad idea to me given the circumstances

I agree, IF you could get it in perfect alignment, It won't stay there. The pin would solve that.

 

[gatlin04]

I agree with what you guys are saying, but im just trying to button it up so that i can sell it. Im not a scumbag, so i will tell the perspective buyers the problem..... i just dont want to deal with the headache. Around the end of January/February I will be looking pretty hard for a extended cab 4x4. I dont mind working on "smaller" problems, but when it comes to machining and stuff like that....WAY OVER MY HEAD!!!!!