I own an import repair shop and many times special tools are needed to do things. Unfortunately the need is discovered while doing the job and no one I know has any import tools I can borrow. We have a good rapport with other shops in town and lend tools willingly back and forth as needed, but usually I am on my own in that respect.
We had a Mini come in with a cam position tone ring problem. It is one of the later Minis with a (finally) BMW engine rather than the Peugeot or Chrysler engine. The tone ring is bolted onto the end of one of the cams and we could see through the position sensor hole that the ring was loose and could also se a 6 mm bolt that had backed out and broken a hole in the valve cover. Simple right? Pop the cover and bolt it back together. Flat rate time for just a cover replacement is 4 hours.
We discovered that not only the intake system and everything on top of the cover has to come off but the injectors have to be pulled as they are also in the way. I made a puller for the injectors out of flat stock that bolted to the injector mounting ring and could then use a small slide hammer to remove them. The fix was performed on the tone ring and it was simply clean up the threads on the bolt and hole in the cam and bolt it on with loctite this time. Replaced the cover and proceeded to put the injectors back in. Following the book there is a special tool that you use to space the injectors a certain amount from the fuel rail that you install them in before assembly. Them once properly spaced you bolt the fuel rail down to seat them in the head. This is a direct injection engine so they go through the head and into the cylinder. After bolting the fuel rail down then you tighten the injectors slowly to draw them up to the fuel rail. This pulls them back out of the head just the precise amount so they are all the same projection in the cylinder.
Sounds complex and I am sorry for the long winded post. Anyway we did not have the tool and it said without it you are likely to break an injector and if so all 3 have to be replace as a set and re coded to the ECU. They did show a picture of the tool and gave the thickness as 8.5mm so I quickly measured bolt spacing and the injector sleeve size and proceeded to make my best guesses.
The pictures show the special tool page with crude measurements (guesses) of sizing, and the final product. It worked like a charm and as you can see it was not a major project in any way, but it did save the day. I flycut a piece of aluminum plate to the desired thickness and cut it to size and milled the slot to my guessed dimensions.
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