lifekenophobic

I'm having trouble removing the bracket that holds the auto tensioner and idler pulleys to the front timing case, and was hoping one of you fine gents could shed some light on what I'm missing. First, a little backstory to help explain the situation.

I am trying to replace the VTC covers on my VQ35HR, thanks to the notorious "sputtering during warm-up" issue. If you're not familiar, here's the thread: https://my350z.com/forum/maintenance...g-warm-up.html. I unplugged the VTC covers for a couple of days, and the sputtering totally disappeared. I spent the coin for both covers and new gaskets, but am now unable to get the old ones off. I started by checking where all of the bolts were that needed to be removed. My issue is the following bolt on the passenger side VTC cover:



Now for the main issue at hand. I can't access that #8 bolt (accurately depicted with devil horns), without removing the following bracket that holds the auto tensioner and idler pulley:



The 3 red circles are the bolts that I removed from the bracket. The red arrow points to a black bar, which this bracket attaches to the BACK of. With all 3 bolts removed, the bracket just pivots up and down as indicated by the yellow line. It doesn't seem like it wants to slide out (as I expected), and seems to somehow still be attached somewhere. I tried removing the bolt behind the pulley marked with the red "X", but it didn't seem to make a difference on being able to loosen the whole thing (plus the radiator fans prevented me from getting it all the way out).

So this is where I'm stuck. I'm frustrated that I spent the time removing everything, just to realize I couldn't finish the job because of ONE FREAKIN' BOLT. At least I was able to replace my serpentine belt since it was off anyway, so at least my efforts weren't a total waste. Any advice is appreciated!

Xrabbix

Im sure you figured this out by now (I'd hope!) But If​​​​​ i remember correctly there is a bolt going through the power steering / alternator Bracket that holds the auto tensioner plate on the left side of the engine

lifekenophobic

I was able to figure it out, but thanks for the reply. I realized I needed to remove the other 2 bolts attached to that alternator bracket, and then the auto tensioner bracket came right out. VTC covers have been replaced and the Z is running much better.

Xrabbix

Oddly I have to do a pair of VTC covers myself. Were you able to do the exhaust valve relearn procedure without consult-iii?