Tensioner plunger holding tool - Dimensions?

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billy_bob
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Tensioner plunger holding tool - Dimensions?

Post by billy_bob »

Hi All,
I'm attempting my first cylinder head removal (ZX 1.9d, '96) and so far have been doing pretty well; apart from a getting a black-eye whilst carelessly loosening the <i>very tight</i> crankshaft pulley bolt!
Anyway, I am now ready to remove the right-hand engine mounting bracket and the Haynes manual says I need to fabricate a tool to be able to <b>hold the tensioner plunger in the engine mounting bracket</b>.
Is this step necessary? If so, can anyone tell me the correct dimensions of this tool? The Citroen part no. for the tool is 7009-T1, if that's any halp.
Thanks in advance,
Billy - nursing a purple shiner!
Dave Burns
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Post by Dave Burns »

Get a 6mm tap, a socket head (alan key) grub screw, drill a 5mm hole in the plunger housing and tap it out, force the plunger and spring in and nip it with the grub screw to hold it in place while the mount is refitted, remove the grub screw to let the plunger back out to do its job again.
Dave
Mosser
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Post by Mosser »

When i did the cam belt on my 406 and had to remove and refit the tensioner, I just let it ping out (it rolled down the drive but didnt have too much force on it),
And when it came to refitting it, i just put a tie wrap round it and pushed it in on the ground, then once i had refitted it i cut the tie wrap and pulled it off before finally tightening the bolts, much easier i thought !
billy_bob
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Post by billy_bob »

Thanks Dave and Mosser. It's now the day after removing the head and in my eagerness to get the job done I'm only reading your posts now.
Dave: I am doing the head removal with the engine in the car - getting a spanner-head next to the punger housing is hard enough. I think what you're suggesting either requires special drilling equiptment or the engine out, although maybe I'm missing the point. I am farley new to this forum and seeing that you have 1500+ posts beneath your name makes me sure I got the wrong end of the stick!
Mosser: Your quick and dirty approach (no offence meant) would have certainly saved me a couple of hours of head scratching. The two problems I see with your solution might be (1) trying to remove the tensioner whilst still under tension from the plunger, leading to possible bending of engine bits(?) and (2) damaging the face of the plunger case - although I'm not sure if this would cause a <i>big</i> problem.
My solution was to try and re-create the Citroen tool mention in the Haynes manual. This took a bit of fiddling, a pair of M8 bolts (not M10 as mentioned in Haynes), nuts and washers and a piece of sheet steel (about 2" x 4").
The steel was folded to give it a 90 degree lip that protruded about 3/4". Two holes drilled into the plate the same distance apart as the two bolts holding the right-hand engine mount to the engine (this was the fiddly part and took a bit of time to get right).
The bolts/nuts/washers were locked into the tool at <i>exactly</i> the right position and then each nut was wiggled into the recess left by the two engine mounting bolts. When the tensioner adjuster was moved into the compressed position the plunger stayed plunged and everything freed up nicely.
Now it's off to the engineers for a skimming!
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