1991 Aerostar with a 4.0L. Alternator removal.

[moon lake rick]

I am working on my 1991 Aerostar alternator. It has the spring loaded idler pulley. Not the adjusting bolt for belt tension. My 1995 Aeroster 3.0 has the bolt tension method.
My 1991 alternator has the 3 bolt mount method. It also has an alternator with an external fan behind the belt pulley but it is not an internal fan.

My question is how do you get at the alternator bolt that is the rear bolt on the lower side{left side facing the vehicle]???Heater box is in the way. Tried universal join. Maybe I need universal join socket?
Heater box is in the way.
Maybe I just need to try harder. Raining right now. I'm not giving up....yet.

 

[BrooklynBay]

Your post was moved into its own thread. When you said that you have a 3.0L 1995 Aerostar, did you mean 1993? My 1995 3.0L Aerostar has an automatic tensioner. The older models had the alternator with the external fan & set screw style tensioner. It would be helpful to see a picture of what you have.

 

[moon lake rick]

93 alternator reply

you are so right. my parts van is a 93 not a 95. either a typo or "brain skip".

the 93 has the bolt adjuster method with the 3.0 engine. it's the 91 that I drive and it has the spring tension system. 4.0 engine.
the 1991 4.0 alternator has 2 plastic plug in wires. it may have another wire but I haven't been able to remove that lower rear bolt on alternator. I will pick up universal socket and try that. heater box close, real close.
I will try to get some pictures and figure out how to post them here. Might help someone else. I got a lot of great tips and info here. I appreciate the pictures and info people take the time to post.

 

[BrooklynBay]

Take a look at the photo below:

It sounds like you're trying to remove the upper left corner bolt. Remove the lower left corner bolt first, then use a ratcheting box wrench on the upper left corner bolt.