gonna try and take off the hub and balancer so that i can change out the opti. just need a diagram or walk through to take off the hub and balancer. i know that i can take off the balancer by itself but i dont have the tool(have the one that has like 4 prongs crow foot i think) and my friend said he couldnt take the balancer off by itself cuz its a B!TCH. anyone have any info, its really appreciated.

 

You do not need to remove the hub to remove the opti. It just has to be positioned so that the opti can slide by it. Rent a 3 jaw puller from autuozone to pull the balancer.

 

Yeah just take a "crow's foot" puller and the pulley comes right off.

Pretty straightforward, three bolts go thru the puller into the pulley and then you use a wrench, ratchet and socket, you hand, etc. to twist the center bolt in the puller until pops off.

 

He can't use that type of puller on a 1993, because the pulley does not have the threaded holes the 96-97s have. He will have to use a claw puller, instead (that is,if his pulley cannot be removed without a puller).

http://shbox.com/1/pull_pulley.jpg

 

My bad

 

got the hub/balancer off yesterday, had to call a friend. the way i got it off was to lossen the bolt that holds the hub on the crank. then bolt on the crow foot to the balancer. i pulled the hub off some slowly, then removed the crow foot and loosened the hub bolt again.just kept doing this till it came off, took about 5-10 minutes but it came off pretty easy. to put it back on i just put the hub on the crank and tightened the bolt without the spacer/washer till it went in more than halfway. removed the crow foot and the hub bolt then placed the washer/spacer back on. put everything together and just tightened the bolt till the crank spun. only sad part is that i went through all that trouble to replace the damn opti and the car still has a miss when its warmed up .

 

Can the balancer be pulled without removing the radiator on a '97 Firebird?

 

well, the damper and hub are seperate, so if all you need to do is get the opti off, all that need to come off it the damper, and on a 97, you can use a puller that uses 3 bolts if the damper is rusted on, but pull the bolts first, it should almost fall off

 

Did you change your spark plug wires, cause mine had a little miss in it, and after lookin it over i found a wire touchin the manifold and it was arcing over and makin a miss, so if you didnt change em, you might want to check that out next.

 

Plugs and plug wires should always be the first suspects with a miss, IMHO.

 

the plugs and wires are brand new and have like 6 hrs and less than 10 miles of use since i got the car started. plugs are tr55 gapped @ .50 and the wires are 7mm autozone replacements cuz i didnt wanna burn new MSD wires again and have to buy another set. pulled the #1 plug and its tan which i think is a good sign right?

 

Check that torque on the hub bolt[75 ft lb]..tightening 'til the crank turns' may not be enough..

 

When a wire is arcing, will you always be able to see it, like you check at night, but see no fireworks, could it still be arcing?