hi ...i have a ford puma millenium 50.000 miles and something has gone drasticaly wrong with her..

i was driving back from the market and huge rotating banging noise started coming from the engine, my partner has jacked the car up and on inspection

when the wheel is rotated the engine is moving with it , and he says the drive shaft is knocking the engine, he is totally lost as to what has gone wrong as the drive shaft and joints etc seem to be ok

he has disconnected the bottom arm to pull the shaft out of the half shaft housing and he has no clue other than when the shaft is slightly pulled out of the housing and rotated the engine does not move ....
any help would be appreciated as ive got the feeling this could be an expensive fix .. thanks in advance

 

have you started the engine with the car not moving

jas

 

yes ....thanks for replying

 

sounds like the clutch/gearbox has broken and it's welded the input shaft of the box to the end of the crankshaft

happened to me on my sierra and it took several attempts to jump on the gearbox with all the bolts undone before it split from the engine

both were out of the car and on the deck so we had plenty of run up

or it could be something as simple as the clutch has gone bang and one of the springs has snagged on the flywheel

pull the starter out first to see if you can spot any obvious damage

 

are there any nosies when you run the engine without moving

jas

 

the engine is fine and still drives ok its just when the wheels rotate the engine moves and after a rotation of the wheel the engine rests back to where it started it moves when the drive shaft turns probably about 10-15mm
ohh and the half shaft oil seal has subsequently shared the gear oil with the road
i can add info u may think will help

 

any help before the garage has my pants down literaly...

 

sounds like you've broken an engine mount then

nowhere near as serious

 

put everything back together again and then, with the engine running but the bonnet up, slowly release the clutch pedal to the biting point and see if the engine rocks back and forth when it reaches that point

 

hi i just tried that today and it does move quite abit
infact cos its completely of the floor at the moment i stuck it in 1st and threw my foot off the clutch and it jumps around quite a bit , but the mountings look ok nothing visualy broken, that i cant tell anyway..

 

Sounds like cv joint to me...
Collapsed....?

 

As above put it in gear and try and pull away in 3rd with the handbrake on.

Watch through the gap in the bonnet and see how high the engine will lift/knock.

 

hi trev thats what my fella said at first but he said there would be allsorts of noises and stuff coming from that area which there isnt ..

 

ahhh so i need to be resting on all fours to check if the mounts have buggered

 

if the conclusion is that the mounts have gone ... how hard a job is it to change them ?
is it diy material or not

 

Just what I was thinking, we had a fiesta at work do that, you'd turn the wheel and it would go passed a tight spot and as it was the engine was getting pusted 20mm+ over to one side.

Can you turn one wheel ok. (front)

 

thats exactly whats happening
one side is fine the other has resistance till u get to a point then the wheeel springs round and the engine moves at the same time
was it the mounts steve 24vs

 

no it was the inner drive shaft joint, which side is yours doing it, ours was the passanger side we put a recon drive shaft on.

 

its the drivers side the one with the half shaft ..
so u mean the cv joint at the wheel hub
would i be able to tell by eye if i took the boot off and all the grease out
would it really push the engine if collapsed there was no strange sound before it happened it just went..?

 

Sounds like cv joint or driveshaft fault if it has resistance on the wheel rotation......engine mount would no way effect the wheel rotation

Mount is just a bit awkward to change, need an engine hoist or something to support engine or to lift block an inch to get old one out.

 

Yeah you should if you de grease it. Check for chewed up metal........

If one side is turning freely and the other is'nt yeah it would not balance evenly so would rock on one side causing a slight lift....

 

i cant get my head round it
my partner says the resistance is from the outer shaft touching the back of the half shaft socket (as though the engine is leaning on it)
or as u say if the cv is chewed up it would not be sat properly

 

ours was the inner cv joint part had broken up and got stuck in the end of the joint so the bearing parts couldn't side in the joint properly, when you turn it see if the shalft is staying in the middle of the joint and not going round like a spiral, ( if you get what I mean )

Had that bottom ball joint been out for any other work before it happen,

I'd money on it, its the of the drivers cv joints if thats the side the goes tight when turned.

 

That sounds very possible but surely by looking at the engine block you'll see if it's not sitting even?

Very much sounds like the cv joint has collapsed and the circlip is still trying to hold it all together

 

the shaft was removed from the half shaft socket and the three bearings on the end of the shaft that slide were all fine and dandy
and it didnt spiral when checked just pushes right to the back of the socket and moves the engine (and thats with the wheels off the ground ,
im guessing it will only be worse when on the floor and the suspension goes up and she shaft pushes further in the socket ..?
i may have to do some more investigation tommorow after work now i have an idea what im looking for

 

just been out to look at how the engine is sat
and it does lean back to the bulkhead quite a bit but i dont have another puma to compare it to would anyone beable to tell from a photo ..?

 

Can you not look at the stress on the opposite engine mount? they should be equal

 

its hard to tell as the right mount is a different type to the left and hidden under the battery tray

 

i think the plan is to degrease the outer cv joint and check it out to see if it is foooked then take it from there
ill update tomoz with good or bad news or just to bash your heads some more...lol
thanks ever so much everyone for taking time to help its very much appreciated ...top site

 

ive just had the drive shaft and cv joint out and dismantled them and all are in perfect nick so that is eliminated ...
so is it likely to be the mounts then ?
could it be any other problem before it goes to the garage ..?

 

check the wishbones in my fiesta i had the rubber bushes in the wishbones faulty (they took an oil bath and got chewed) so when i steered the the shaft was pushed inside the cv joint and it made a loud noise and created resistance for the wheel to turn.... I didn t take care of it and ended up with a ruined CV joint and finally i couldn t reverse cause the shaft would slip inside the cv joint. so whatever it is do not risk like I did cause the cost will only increase