Harmonic balancer broke

[99 gst spyder]

So I had my car tune and dyno 376 who/325 trq, in June this year to get ready for this July 4th weekend so we went out cruising and I went wot in 2nd gear and my harmonic balancer and split into two pieces and lost the belt, water pump, and power steering altogether.
My question is, should I get another oem pulley ($79.99)or should I just go for the fluidampr ($320.00) pulley? Please considering my whp/trq output.
Does high whp/trq have anything to do with the broken harmonic balancer pulley? Or when (whp range) should you upgrade the pulley to the fluidampr pulley?

Tight of money right now but needed to know if oem can handle the power or is it just old that it broke into two pieces..

 

[Zex4g63]

OEM is fine for now. You are lucky it didn't take out the timing belt.

 

[99 gst spyder]

OEM is fine for now. You are lucky it didn't take out the timing belt.

Thanks.. Timing belt is good and the motor still runs. I am still gonna make sure all timing and everything is line up too..

 

[synthetek]

It probably broke because it was old, not the whp/trq.

 

[Roberti 2G]

Where can you get the oem one for 80? I am in need of one as well.

 

[Matt_4G63]

Mine broke due to age as well. Rockauto had a good price on them.

 

[pauleyman]

Old old well documented problem. Oem has done more than that. Get a new OEM unit. Did I mention OEM?

 

[99 gst spyder]

Okay. I found the Dorman From autzone for 79.99 and probably going to get a very good discount on it for maybe even cheaper. Are the dorman like oem?

 

[pauleyman]

NO. they most certainly are NOT. OEM means oem.

 

[Roberti 2G]

Yeah an OEM one will cost 135-162. This is the price range i found them for yesterday.

 

[99 gst spyder]

Will the dorman work?

One question is when the pulley broke off, the timing belt seem to be sitting to the far driver side on the cams. Anyone on this? Before it was sitting more to the passenger side.

 

[pauleyman]

What part of oem are you missing? will a dorman allow you to drive down the road? Of course it will. I already made my opinion clear, it is not what you should use.
If you do not value my opinion fine but 25 years have proven to me not to use it. If the money is that big of a deal to you then I am also of the opinion you own the wrong car. It is what it is. You may do anything you wish, its your car. I will tell you this, I gave a very clear opinion, dont say you weren't warned.

On the timing belt if there was no damage to the cover the balancer likely did not affect anything. If you have a problem it lies elsewhere under the cover.

 

[99 gst spyder]

What part of oem are you missing? will a dorman allow you to drive down the road? Of course it will. I already made my opinion clear, it is not what you should use.
If you do not value my opinion fine but 25 years have proven to me not to use it. If the money is that big of a deal to you then I am also of the opinion you own the wrong car. It is what it is. You may do anything you wish, its your car. I will tell you this, I gave a very clear opinion, dont say you weren't warned.

On the timing belt if there was no damage to the cover the balancer likely did not affect anything. If you have a problem it lies elsewhere under the cover.

I totally understand where you are coming from but in that case we all or most of us made cheap choice by modding these kinds of cars. I'm pretty sure everyone if not most had made the cheap choice as long as it works.

 

[99 gst spyder]

Recheck timing belt and it is loose... Pretty loose on the top where I can push it down a few to 5 mm.. Anyone have any idea if it can ruin anything else if timing skipped?

 

[Fullthrottle7]

It can ruin everything if timing skipped, but typically if it was caught quickly and not forced to keep running then usually just valves get bent. It doesn't sound like you jumped timing though, being a little loose between the cam gears is normal depending on where the cams are in their rotation though, you should be able to grab the belt between your thumb and finger on the sides and twist it to where it almost turns vertical. If it is loose enough to where it can slide off of one of the gears however, that is another story entirely. It sounds like it may have gotten smacked when the dampener came apart and given a little jolt, but you won't know for sure how serious it is until you get the cover off and check it out. Make sure your tensioner pulley is still rotated into the correct position and that your tensioner arm is where it should be. If you have a tiny allen wrench or the grenade pin see if it can still slide in and out. If not, you're that deep so you may as well just rotate it to TDC and do a timing job I'd rather be safe than sorry.

On another note, if you don't want to pay the $150 for an OEM dampener I have several as I'm sure others do as well. As long as the rubber inbetween the outer and inner sections are in good shape, they are fine to reuse. Just keep an eye on them in the future every few oil changes. I bet you could have caught that blow up before it happened by twisting/pulling on it routinely. GL with the car!

 

[99 gst spyder]

It can ruin everything if timing skipped, but typically if it was caught quickly and not forced to keep running then usually just valves get bent. It doesn't sound like you jumped timing though, being a little loose between the cam gears is normal depending on where the cams are in their rotation though, you should be able to grab the belt between your thumb and finger on the sides and twist it to where it almost turns vertical. If it is loose enough to where it can slide off of one of the gears however, that is another story entirely. It sounds like it may have gotten smacked when the dampener came apart and given a little jolt, but you won't know for sure how serious it is until you get the cover off and check it out. Make sure your tensioner pulley is still rotated into the correct position and that your tensioner arm is where it should be. If you have a tiny allen wrench or the grenade pin see if it can still slide in and out. If not, you're that deep so you may as well just rotate it to TDC and do a timing job I'd rather be safe than sorry.

On another note, if you don't want to pay the $150 for an OEM dampener I have several as I'm sure others do as well. As long as the rubber inbetween the outer and inner sections are in good shape, they are fine to reuse. Just keep an eye on them in the future every few oil changes. I bet you could have caught that blow up before it happened by twisting/pulling on it routinely. GL with the car!

Thank alot. I've done multiple timing belt jobs on these cars and familiar with them. I do plan on TDC everything and redo the whole timing belt job too just to make sure. The belt has some slack but belt was never this loose until this happend. I'll check it out this weekend.

Well my cousin works at the autoshop and he can give away half price off the harmonic pulley and free o2 bosch sensor for my aem wideband. He hooks me up or most of the time free brand new parts that's why I'm thinking about it.