I have a V6 Chevy Astro with 5-speed manual transmission, and for more than half a year, I've been trying to get the clutch pilot bushing out. I tried all the suggestions that I could find previously posted here, and finally I came up with my own method that worked.
Suggestions that didn't work (you can skip this part)
- Hacksaw through it - nope, takes too long. I don't have that much time to work on it.
- Shove grease or wet toilet paper behind, get something round that just fits the hole, and hammer in - supposedly works "every time," according to some of those who have tried it. But it didn't work for me. Stuck too tight or something. I first tried grease, with a socket that almost fit the hole, with electrical tape wrapped around the socket to make it fit better. The next time, I tried wet toilet paper, with a bolt that we filed down to fit very snugly in the bushing, and hammered hard enough so that the small bits of toilet paper shot out around the bolt fast enough to make my hand hurt when they hit the rubber glove I was wearing. The bushing moved about 1/64 of an inch maybe, but then it stopped and wouldn't go further (probably water creating surface tension around it).
- Use a blowtorch and melt the bushing. - No, I didn't try this. Whoever suggested it before did so mostly in jest, and besides, I don't have a blowtorch.
- Use the proper tool (GM tool number J-1448) - Unfortunately, this tool seems to be impossible to find. The local GM dealer doesn't have one. I did find a puller tool at Autozone, that attaches to a slide hammer, but I broke the tool instead of moving the bearing.
My method that worked
So, after failing on all of these things, I finally decided to drill through the bearing. I don't know why this wasn't ever suggested by anyone I talked to or read newsgroup posts from. Maybe because of the danger of drilling into the crankshaft instead of the bushing, but I was careful, and I only made two tiny nicks in the steel, which were small enough to sand down in a few seconds with some sandpaper. I drilled a small, shallow (the shallower, the better) pilot hole a tiny bit closer to the steel crankshaft than to the inner edge of the brass bushing. Then I chose a drill bit just large enough to leave as little brass as possible on the outer edge of the bushing, without getting into the steel crankshaft. I did this four times, on the top, bottom, left, and right of the center. Then I took a hammer and screwdriver and hammered through the brass from the inner part where the transmission shaft would go, into the holes I had drilled. Then I placed the screwdriver against the outer edge of one of the sectors, and hammered toward the center. Bending that sector in and out a few times broke it loose. The other 3/4 of the bearing were still stuck, but they all came loose at once when I started hammering on the second sector.
This was a happy ending to months of frustration. I was getting ready to walk into an automotive shop with $200 cash in my hand, and offer it to the first person who could remove that bearing. But this way was a lot cheaper, and probably worked better, too.
Now, what's this I hear about a small peice of grease-soaked felt that's supposed to be installed behind the new bushing? Is that required for my van? What kind of grease should be used?
-Daniel Narvaes