Harmonic balancer puller bolts get tight real quick

Hello all-
I’m doing my timing belt. I’m following Timmy the tool man’s video on YouTube. In his video he threads two M8 x 1.25 x 100 mm bolts into the balancer and uses a pulley puller to pull the balancer off. He threads his bolts what appear to be about an inch into the balancer to where he has a quarter inch of thread sticking out the back. When I go to thread mine in they get very tight quickly. I’ve only threaded them by hand until they feel real tight, and when I back them out, about a heavy 1/4 inch or so of the threads were dirty, telling me they’re not seating very far. I juiced them with some lubricant to the same result. Is this normal? Can I crank them down without boning myself? I’m afraid to proceed until I can get some guidance thank you

 

There could be dirt in the threads on the balancer, or rust. Try cleaning it out

Are you positive you have the right bolts? Metric not SAE?

 

That'd be my guess, wrong bolts or the threads are messed up on the balancer. Do you have a feel for running those bolts in and be able to tell from dirty threads vs actually being the wrong pitch?

 

Aren't the puller threads 8x1.25? There should be 8x1.25 bolts all over the engine bay. Pull one out and compare threads so you know the puller bolts are correct

If you're sure you have the correct bolts, put a little goop on the threads and keep going

 

Noticed the same with my harmonic balancer -- it's like some of the rubber/adhesive that holds the parts of the balancer together seeped into the threaded holes (mine may or may not be aftermarket).

Definitely crank it in there once you confirm that the thread size is right-though -- managed to break some of the outside of my balancer by trying to pull it when the puller bolts weren't deep enough.

 

Whenever I have to screw a bolt into a threaded hold for pulley removal or installation I clean the threads out first with either a tap or thread restorer, Ive found that if there's dried dirt/clay a tap works better cause it'll cut through the foreign material. Obviously do this at your own risk - only use hand tools, make sure the tap or restorer is the correct size/thread pitch, and is going in straight.

 

I got it off. I took an old mascara brush and stuck it in my little drill and juiced the holes with pb blaster and blindly cleaned the threads and eventually got the bolts to seat. Thank you all and sorry for the dumb questions. Just don’t want to screw this up