Today was the big day. Pulled the IMS. Now that the cams were locked I removed the crank tensioner and the cylinder 4-6 tensioner on the right-hand side. Here's the crank tensioner coming out:
I bagged and labeled the tensioners since they are not interchangeable. Actually, I bag and EVERYTHING since it can be difficult to recall later during reassembly. I removed the three bolts and retaining nut on the flange and removed the flange. Mine had the old, single-o-ring seal on the flange but as stated earlier it had performed well with no leaking. I screwed the threaded rod onto the bearing shaft, placed the press over it, threaded the nut, and oiled the nut. You can see the tool setup here:
Several of the IMS removal instructions refer-to a C-clip that retains the bearing. But mine is a '99 with double-row bearing (expected for this vintage and verified by the shallow dish on the outside of the bearing flange seen above). A 13 mm wrench holds the end of the tool shaft, and a 24mm wrench turns the nut clockwise to pull the bearing out. It initially took a fair amount of force to turn the wrench and did my best to twist without torquing too hard in one direction. Keeping the ends of the wrenches in a similar position for the hard work (e.g. one at "4pm" and the other at "3pm") helped. Not sure that was necessary but wanted to pull things out straight. Once it started to move, it was much easier to extract. It came right out along with oil that filled over 1/3 of the inner IMS shaft! The pic below was caught after the initial flow cam out:
Removed the bearing, tapped out the shaft, and yep, it was in perfect condition. Tight, smooth, no play, no sludge or bearing particle wear around the seals. This bearing was held in place by a small wire/clip which fits into a slot on the bearing housing. When the bearing was installed, the clip expanded into a slot in the engine case -- and also gave-way during the extraction as I think it's designed to do. My vehicle was low mileage (42K) with double-row bearing but also 21+ years old and often sat unused for long periods of time. The vehicle condition was good and seemed not to be abused, but I didn't have full service records so no idea how well they changed the oil or how they drove it. Upon inspection, seems it could have likely functioned for many more miles. But glad I pulled it. The new EPS open roller bearing will have an oil feed and with no seals the IMS will drain instead of remaining filled with oil. And the clutch, flywheel, and input shaft clearly needed attention so no regrets.
