So everything I’ve found says 80ft/lbs for the crank bolt. As I tighten this thing it keeps pulling the harmonic balancer inward to the point the out lip of the pulley is going behind the timing indicator on the timing cover. Do I keep cranking away?

 

Keep tightening it down until it's flush with the front of the crankshaft. The bolt tightens down against the crankshaft.

 

Excellent thank you. I tighter it down to 80ft/lbs. now I just realized I didn’t tighten down the little bolt behind the harmonic balancer as I thought I read here to leave the bolts loose so the harmonic balancer can Center itself and the cover plate would Center itself around the harmonic balancer and then tighten everything down. Is there a trick to tightening this last 3/8 bolt? I really hope I don’t have to pull the harmonic balancer off a third time… first time I forget to install the curved washer in the crank timing gear.

 

Can you get to it with an open-end wrench from the 4-5 o'clock position? The WJ 4.0 I have sitting around doesn't have those timing marks. Other than that, it seems like you'll have to pull it off at least far enough to get in there...

 

I'll do the right thing and pull it off. It would be catastrophic if that bolt fell off.

 

Someone got you good.

Looks like you're pulling that balancer off a 3rd time.

And the preferred method is to install the balancer with a special tool, which can be made from a piece of threaded rod (of the same thread pitch/diameter of the crank pulley bolt) a pair of washers, some anti-seize, and a nut. Too many times with the crank pulley bolt and it could actually snap.

 

Using the stock bolt to pull the HB on also tends to rip out the threads in the end of the snout, because it only grabs a few threads at first. X2 on a longer bolt threaded all the way in and using a nut to push it on.

 

Is this a stock motor/stock crankshaft...stroker cranks have different snout lengths depending on exact model and may need a spacer

 

Definitely stock

 

Job done. The bolts are all appropriately torqued to spec. I ended up going to Oreillys and checked out an installation kit that I’ll return tomorrow.

 

Awesome work!