Advice Appreciated - Crankshaft vibration damper

[Stevie A]

I have an 2.6 M103 engine. The vibration damper on the crankshaft started rattling at weekend. I have taken the pulley and the vibration damper disc off the car.

On re-assembly does the disc need to be lined up with the pulley - there is a small hole on the damper disc - is this for lining up with the pulley? Or should the disc just be put on and then is it just a case of just tightening up the pulley. Should the damper disc be able to spin freely? Do I need just a new damper disc, or the plate at the back of the hub too? I presume the friction material on the back of the damper disc has just worn away enough to let it rattle?

All advice appreciated, particularly from anyone who has changed one of these. How does the damper work?

 

[Stevie A]

I have ordered the part for this and it turns out the pulley and vibration damper / absorber disc are not joined together. I am wondering how the disc spins though and if it is supposed to spin in sync with the crankshaft pulley. If somebody could have a look at their engine and see if the big disc behind the crankshaft pulley spins in sync with the pulley I'd be grateful. I am going to ask at the MB dealer where I am getting the disc. £200 for a thing that looks like a brake disc!

 

[Stevie A]

I shall post my experience with this for posterity and to help anyone in the future.

The round vibration damper disc / harmonic balancer behind the crankshaft pulley had split into two parts. One part was stuck on the hub. I nearly gave up after several days and attempts to get the disc off. I was successful using a tommy bar and a bigger bar and prying this behind the disc against the engine. After turning the engine 180 degrees between prys and several turns the disc popped off. It is on a small locating dowel so the new disc can only go on one way hence the TDC sensor is ok and lined up correctly with the damper disc. How do you spell pry???

I'm back in business. Yeehah!!

 

[stargazerplus]

Dunno what the plural of pry is... probably pries! Well done.... I know how hard this job can be!