1995 Toyota 4Runner blowing fuses and A/C Clutch Replacement

During a recent trip, the A/C fuse blew.  This fuse  is in relay box #3, behind the dashboard on the passenger side, near the door...  accessible only when the dash is taken apart - nice!  The A/C was making air before there was a nasty burning plastic smell and the fuse blew.

I put in a new fuse - it blew right away.  I tried a 20A fuse (2x the original 10A) and it held for a bit; the compressor ran very intermittently and again released some horrible smell.  I cut it off right away.

Because the compressor still turned, both then and later by hand, I assumed it wasn't shot, but that the A/C clutch had burned up.  The shop I took the truck to said it took so much labor to replace, it wasn't worth it - just replace the compressor and essentially rebuild the A/C system (new dryer, expansion, o-rings etc.).  Just under $1000 total.  Yuck-O.

A survey of the internet yielded this link:
http://www.yotatech.com/f2/c-blowing-fuses-what-could-214151/
I found just enough good ideas there to believe replacing the clutch was something I could manage.  I found a replacement clutch on ebay for just less than $70.  If this worked...pretty big savings.

So I started taking things off the car.  Loosened all the belts first, then took off the shroud and fan/fan-clutch to make space.  Also dropped the steering damper to make some space below, and removed a little cover in the front passenger wheel-well to get access to the compressor bolts.  Space is super tight, but between using wrenches and a u-joint adapter with some creative extensions, all the bolts came loose.  The compressor could be moved around quite a bit, enough for access, even still connected to the refrigerant lines.

The clutch is supposed to come apart like this:

(Note that clicking on an image should yield a bigger version.)

The bolt at the front was the first pain - the compressor wanted to turn.  I was finally able to hold the middle bit (88403 in the diagram) with some pliers and a wrap of nylon cord and get the bolt loose - it loosens the normal way (at first I was worried it might be reverse thread - it isn't).  The front piece came off easily.

The pulley is held in by a snap ring, which wasn't easy to get out in tight quarters, but I eventually pried it free.  The pulley, however, was still totally German-stuck (gutenstuk).  I needed a close-quarters pulley-puller.

I rolled my own from a 3/4" section of square aluminum channel, a T-nut, bolt with some normal nuts, and a couple c-clamps as shown:

I drilled a hole through the channel and hot-glued the T-nut in place in the hole.  The bolt was a 5/16"-18, and the two nuts tightened against each other at the end of the bolt made something flat to push up against the shaft of the compressor with.

The puller worked like a charm.  Here it is in place to start:

Soon the pulley was sliding free...note the gap forming behind the pulley:

As seen in the exploded diagram, there is another pain-in-the-ass snap ring to remove after the pulley is off; the coil then pulls easily off the shaft.  Below are the A/C clutch parts, removed; on the right is the guilty fellow - yeah, I think that coil is shot...

Next: replacement with the new parts!