I'm about to cut a hole in my car!

[jmlee44]

Ok I'm stumped. The other morning, started up the Camry to a god awful rattling noise - got out and looked, and it was coming from under the timing cover.

Ok - so we're taking the 4x4 to work today. Day two - I remove the top timing cover to have a look around. I can see the belt is immensely loose and the idler pulley near the bottom of the motor is loose. Bad pulley? Of course not. As soon as I release the remaining belt tension, the idler falls off - the bolt has sheared clean off - my luck!

So here's the thing - that area is within mere inches of the metal body of the inner fender area. Can barely get hand tools down there, much less a tap to extract the bolt.

So I'm thinking - option A, lift the motor and gain access

Option B - use a small hole saw under the passenger's fender directly across from where I need to pull that bolt. My only concern is it seems like fairly thick metal so I'm wondering if it is structural? Visibly, you wouldn't be able to see it from the outside of the car, and I could easily tak weld the circle back in just for the sake of having it there.

What do you guys think - is it a bad idea? Any other suggestions to get the bolt stub out of the side of the motor?

It's a 98 4Cyl auto. I wasn't planning on doing a TB job right now - I just replaced the belt, seals, tensioner etc a year or so ago. I suppose I will get a new belt because it frayed the edges a little, but AAHHH!

[Chris Crash]

That's the frame, a small hole probably wouldn't hurt the structural integrity, but I bet it'd be prettty hard to cut through.

I'd support it from above with an engine hoist, and lower the subframe enough to get access.

[71Corolla]

You might not need a tap to get the remains of the bolt out, what's left of the bolt might be basically finger tight. So it is just a matter of getting a small, sharp tool in there to turn the bolt enough to extract it. Before you start drilling holes in the strut tower or somewhere else, pull the timing belt components off to have a better look and go from there.