I was driving with my Dad from school in Missoula Montana to Chicago and the engine of my 1982 300 TD seized up outside of Madison Wisconsin. The lower pulley assembly came apart and one of the pulley wheels sheared completely off the block and the fan belts came off. The engine was running well throughout the entire trip and since I bought it 30,000 miles ago, it has 157,000 miles on it. The oil pressure and level where okay leading up to when the engine seized up. I think it may be the water pump died. The car is now at the Merc. dealership in Madison WI, my Dad and I are in Chicago, we took the bus from Madison to Chicago. Any ideas what caused the engine to seize, I think the water pump broke.

From your description it sounds like the harmonic balancer may have let go. It won't be cheap to fix (given the collateral damage) but it should all be external damage.

Good luck.

Thanks Can't Know for the reply. I just now looked up the harmonic balancer and that looks like the part where the pins or bolts have sheared off.

It's probably not seized. Harmonic balancer failure is fairly common on these engines. Depending on how it failed, the fix could be either relatively easy, or pretty difficult. Lots of threads on the topics here.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

question to all who know...

is is just the issue of the bolts holding the harmonic balancer that sheared off or it is an issue with the actual harmonic balancer?

could i just change the bolts on mine (car runs fine now) as a precaution and be done with it?

__________________
Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

Both those things happen as well as failure of the dowel pins which hold the whole assembly to the crankshaft.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

so is it prudent to replace the harmonic balancer and the pins/bolts as a precaution?

__________________
Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

No. There are accounts of second failures after replacement so in my opinion pre-emptive replacement is unwise. A few chicken sacrifices to the gods are probably a good substitute.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

Here is all the information you should need.
FYI: Click through the following links, for an overview of the whole job.
Call me if there are questions.

000007008244 Dowel for harmonic balancer, Large Engine Application List

Extracting Broken Bolts, Studs, Extractors, Drill bits, and Taps

PeachPartsWiki: Replacing Front Crankshaft Seal with "Special Tool"

6150310051 Harmonic/crank spacer ring/seal ring

Diesel Harmonic Balancer threads

Main seal front/rear and harmonic balancer + Pulley


.

__________________
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1985 300SD
1983 300D
2003 Volvo V70

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Absolutely agree with Kerry - leave well alone.

I tried to get to the bottom of why these things go wrong here

Research - Why so many OM61X balancer failures?

Unfortunately there's nothing so simple like gardening in the moonlight to cure all evils. So you may as well toss the chickens into the abyss.

__________________
1992 W201 190E 1.8 171,000 km - Daily driver
1981 W123 300D ~ 100,000 miles / 160,000 km - project car stripped to the bone
1965 Land Rover Series 2a Station Wagon CIS recovery therapy!
1961 Volvo PV544 Bare metal rat rod-ish thing

I'm here to chat about cars and to help others - I'm not here "to always be right" like an internet warrior



Don't leave that there - I'll take it to bits!

For starters, the "harmonic balancer" assembly actually consists of three separate components. The balancing disc is secured to the crankshaft by a large, single bolt. Two dowel pins prevent relative rotation. Then the vibration damper and pulley are secured to the balancing disc by six socket head cap screws.

If you want to engage in some preventive action, I would suggest checking the torque on the six cap screws. And maybe just verifying that the large bolt isn't loose.

__________________
When cryptography is outlawed, bayl bhgynjf jvyy unir cevinpl.

The car is at Zimbrick Motors, I assume? There are worse dealerships, but if you need to find another place for service, I'd recommend Brooklyn Motoren Werke ... the shop is about 15 miles south of Madison.

Thanks everyone for the comments!

My wagon is at Zimbrick in Madison. They quoted me 1100 for parts and 600 for labor today. I know I can get the parts here at peachparts or elsewhere for much less than that, probably a third of their quote. Tomorrow i'll ask the guys at Zimbrick if they know the parts numbers or i'll look them up. I read the threads last night on the harmonic balancer. I doubt there is internal damage to the crankshaft, but I don't think i'll know for sure until I get the engine running again. The engine was running well, before the lights on the dash went on and the temp gauge went up, that is when I immediately pulled to the side of the road. I am debating whether I should have Zimbrick work on my car or someone else like the people Maki suggested. Tomorrow i'll give Brooklyn M. W. a ring. Thanks Phil for the links. I'll read through them before I go to bed and i'll call you if I have any q's tomorrow. Thanks everyone!!

Both the parts and labor end of that estimate seem high to me. Water pump should be ok. It depends partly on what failed, did they tell you exactly what failed? If it was the bolts holding the pulley to the balancer, it seems extremely high. If it's the bolt holding the whole assembly to the crank, pretty high. A well-inspected used pulley/balancer should work and that's not going to be more than a few hundred dollars max.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

In Madison, the next day a service guy jiggled the whole assembly and i'm pretty sure the whole thing came apart. The pulley and the disk with the 6 bolts sheared off, fell to the ground with little resistance... I just called the dealership again to follow up with them and left a message asking about the parts.