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Hey E36 fanatic, Steven here. Today I'm working on another four-cylinder BMW E36. This is a 1995
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and basically what I've been doing lately is changing a few of the pulleys on this car
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It was having a lot of, the pulleys were making a lot of noise. I still need to replace a tensioner
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pulley but today I'm actually going to replace the alternator and I'll show you why. It's going to
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rev it up. You hear that noise? Now it makes that squeaking kind of bad bearing noise more
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when it's really cold outside. However, he's noticed when he revs up the vehicle a bit
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it makes it quite bad as well then too. So I'd already replaced the water pump before
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and I've replaced this idler pulley right here. It was making some noise
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And so now the rest of the noise seems to be coming from the alternator
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So I'm going to go ahead and replace that as well. And then hopefully we will be done replacing stuff at that point
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Luckily the alternator is really easy to replace on this vehicle. Alternators have gotten really expensive over the years though
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but like I said it's quite an easy replacement. All right so the first thing you got to do to get
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to your alternator you're going to need to go ahead and loosen up on this boot right here
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This you could technically do it from here too and just pull off the mass airflow there but
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the more room the better. So loosen it up on here you got this sensor
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and then you got this one right here. Pull those two off you got two 10 millimeters right here
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remove those okay so next thing you want to go ahead and do is go get the power
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the serpentine belt out of the way here's your tensioner right here just turn it
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now i highly suggest that you make a diagram of the belt i don't do that anymore on these cars
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just because i've been working on these same four-cylinder e36s for years they're all routed
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the same but i would highly suggest doing that next thing you're going to want to do oh man
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so when i spin this alternator you can hear that noise it's making now that noise is about you know
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times 10 times 20 when the thing's actually spinning fast so there's another once you
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actually got it off the belt you can spin it and tell now you have to remove this idler pulley on
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the four-cylinder motors to get to this alternator and this would be a very good
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time to change this idler pulley. However on this car it's brand new so
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there no way I changing a brand new part that I just changed two weeks ago So I just gonna pop it off set it over there when you remove it
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remember you got this metal cap here it's supposed to be placed back like this in this orientation set that there another thing while you're here changing
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if you're changing this alternator take a look at your belt obviously but also
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Also take a look at this tensioner. See how this tensioner is free spinning like that
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Also I noticed when it's moving at high RPMs the tensioner moves a little bit
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It's got a little play. So this is bad. The tensioner and the pulley is bad
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I'm not going to change that right now though because the local auto parts store does not
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have it. So I'm going to worry about the alternator. So next thing you're going to want to go ahead and do, like I said this is a really easy
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job to do. You have two bolts holding in this alternator. One right here and then one down here
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They are 13mm if I recall but somehow I found a standard that works for it too
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Now another thing you're going to want to do is of course you're going to want to cut
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power to your battery because if I recall that hot wires always getting
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juice to this alternator don't hold me to it but if I recall it's always
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getting juice so you're gonna want cut power to the battery before you start
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messing with the wiring in the back All right, there's that second one
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All right, next step is to pull that battery. I recall because I pulled these things before, it's got a big red wire and then a small black
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one and that's it. But you can't really get to it. I don't like to try and get to it while it's still attached here
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I'd rather pull it out of here first and then get to it because it's got a little
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this wire right here has a little bit of a pull. So what I do, take the PB blaster, get it in this area right here
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And you'll understand why I do that here in a minute because it is usually a pain
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to get these things in and out. And the reason being is when you bolt, when you put a bolt through here, it actually, it's got like these two little pistons on the inside of this alternator and the threads
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They actually compress into this bracket right here. So I got my handy dandy
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And look at that, that was pretty easy. I'm happy with that. Let me get the second one up
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And there we go all right next step is to get these two wires out if I recall one of them
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13 and one of them is a 10. That's what I'm betting
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I'll tell you guys, I love working on these four cylinders. Everything's so easy on them for the most part
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all right now here's the alternator it's all screwed up i wonder where this popped off from one of the studs popped out of the casing
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and i had to crack the plastic to even get it get the nut off of the stud
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but you can see these two little stay still you can see this this metal right here actually
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compresses in when you fit in the alternator and put the bolt in and that's what makes it really
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really tight so and there is my old used alternator ready to go all right so i got the new alternator
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from I picked it up from O'Reilly's this thing's gonna cost you about 200 to 230 bucks probably
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might be able to get cheaper offline or if you're like me and got an account with them might be able
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to get cheaper so when you pick it up though there's three options at least for this vehicle
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there were and alternators they put on these E36s you're gonna want the one if you have an idler
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pulley that blocks the way on the alternator you're gonna want to get the one that does that
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It's got a second space for a bolt because one of them doesn't come with these two bolts right here to put two bolts in
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The other thing is, now the reason I'm changing this thing is because the bearings inside are making a horrendous noise
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But there are, of course, your alternator can just go bad like your regulator can go bad
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And then your alternator won't charge your battery. This car has about 140,000-150,000 miles on it
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So sometimes you can actually rebuild these things and change the bearings, but with the
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amount of miles on it, I figured it was best to go ahead and change the whole alternator
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since it was already going bad. So first thing you're going to want to do is get it wired up
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Should be pretty obvious which wires go on which
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Okay, so at this point I'm popping in a new alternator. I don really have to spray the new one but it just makes it even easier So why not Come on There we go
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Okay, so sometimes these things aren't as easy to put in as the new ones
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This is a remanufactured unit. which could make it a little more of a pain
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with nothing we can't handle. All right, so the best way to do this
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is get the bottom stud in first, get the bottom one in first
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and then go with the top one. The top one's easy to get
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It's the bottom one that can be the tough one to do. So I got a bottom one partially threaded in
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And now, go on the top. Tighten those two bolts
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There we go. And I already got these wires in the back. Make sure that cover's on in the back
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Now you've got that idler pulley. If you remember what I told you, just keep it aligned like this and you won't have any trouble
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replace it i would they're pretty cheap i'll just pop that back on
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all right so once you're done with the alternator and everything putting the belt back on i suggest testing it before you put your mass airflow sensor and everything back on
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Don't worry, the car runs just fine without it. Well, I mean, it runs a little rough, but it runs
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Cruise control. Alright, hit it. Hit it. Alright, alright
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Well, as you can hear, the annoying noise is gone. So, we've taken care of that problem
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and got a new alternator on it now. Like I said, very easy job to do and when you're in there you might as well if you got an old belt or some other
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old pulleys replace those i hope you enjoyed this video and it helped out y'all have a good one