Well that was fun. Turns out I somehow shredded the crankshaft seal. The good news is it looks like I can replace that without pulling the oil pump off. At this point I'm just documenting for the (hopefully never) next poor soul to have this many roadblocks to getting their TL back on the road lol

 

Oh yea I wanted to ask how do you guys manage to re use the tensioner? I no longer have the pin so I'm not sure what I'd use to block it after I compress it with a C clamp

 

if you thread in one of battery holders, would that collapse tensioner enough to put belt back?

 

^^
If you have an extra tensioner with the areas intact that will allow for a pin to hold the plunger, not like your picture above , then compress it in either a vice or c-clamp and use something like an old appropriately sized drill bit to run through all the holes.

Something you can grasp onto with a vice-grip securely and give a good yank to extract the pin with one good action.

In addition, when you get the old shredded crankshaft seal out, take a picture so we can see how disfigured the crankshaft made it.

 

Totally forgot about the battery tie town! Thank you!

As for the seal, as with many things on this project, probably user error, looks like when I put the pump back on the inner part of the seal folded in and got snagged... woopsie.

I've learned a shit ton about this side of my engine though lol.

thanks a ton for everything everyone! Hopefully I only have to update the thread one more time, saying my car works great lol

 

man... you need to grease the inside and outside of the seal before pushing in, otherwise, the seal will roll, especially the inside. The way I did it was using multi-purpose grease on the inside, this is recommended within the service manual. I used fresh engine oil on the outside ring. Then I used a PVC pipe that's about the size of the outside diameter of the seal, with a washer big enough to fit the crank bolt through, then I used a 19mm on a 1/2" drive wrench and drove it in slowly. Then I made sure it's flush by running my hand around it. I even doubled up by using a socket with a mallet and lightly tapped all the way around the circumference of the seal.

For the tensioner, you can use a small short drill bit to stick it through to hold it back. This has been done before. Drill bit is steel and is stiff.

 

Such a great thread; lots of great info to keep in mind when I finally get the itch to repair my TL that sweats oil. you know...the leak that is small enough to see, but doesn't quite drip to the ground.

 

This thread tells people to not man-handle vital engine parts. Man-handle suspension bolts?! SURE! do that, but don't do Scotty Kilmer UUNNN!! on the tensioner bolt, or UUNNN! on the crank seal.