Pulleys and brackets

Brian · 06-12-04, 06:38 PM

My motor arrives next week and I need a source for pulleys and brackets for the front end. The engine builder and I determined that his set would not fit, so we cancelled it from the order. I contacted March, no luck. Are there any catalogs that may just list a bunch of pulleys, brackets and standoffs for the diy folks?
thx
Brian

Steve Toner · 06-12-04, 08:31 PM

If March can't help there's something very strange going on. What is it about your setup that is causing problems?

I have a 302 water pump on a 289 engine & had to fabricate some spacers to make everything fit, but I've got standard off-the-shelf pulleys & alt brackets (OK, the adjusting bracket is from a 1970 6 cylinder engine, I think, but that's because of the Powermaster alternator...)

Bill Bayard · 06-12-04, 10:03 PM

March should have pulleys to fit your engine.

As for brackets, there are plenty available. It's not that

difficult to manufacture your own. I used one aftermarket

bracket(for alternator adjustment), and built the rest from

1/4"x1" aluminum bar stock, a stainless steel turnbuckle

(A/C adjustment), and a couple of spacers. Pretty simple

stuff, just time consuming, figuring out what will work.

Bill

Peter D · 06-13-04, 07:42 AM

Hi Brian, After searching wrecking yards without success, I ended up buying a "whole of engine front" setup from Robert Logan at RF - magic solution - all pulleys (I elected to go V-belt), alt, a/c comp, w/pump, belts, brackets, nuts, bolts, etc (& the whole lot fitted perfectly on my DRB after a tiny bit of relieving the pulley recesses in the bulkhead/engine cover).

That exercise probably shaved a month or two of "re-inventing the wheel" faffing around off the build time, & saved the kids from learning even more interesting bits of vocabulary !!

Kind Regards,

Peter D.

Mark Worthington · 06-13-04, 11:48 AM

Brian, do you want a V-belt setup or a serpentine belt setup? My engine is set up for V belts but I think I'd rather have a serpentine belt. I've been thinking of ordering the serpentine setup from RF. If you want the V-belt setup maybe we could swap.

Brian · 06-13-04, 12:47 PM

I suspect what threw March off was the FMS short water pump. Needing all the room up front I can get, I elected to shorten up the front of the motor as much as possible. March wants me to retro-fit stock 5.0 stuff and go with their serpentine belt set up, I don't know who was on the other end that sent the email, but this does not show a great deal of thinking on their part.
This is not rocket science, I have to keep ONE belt in plane between the crank, water pump and alternator. V-belt, serpentine, I don't care as long as everything turns and the belt does not fly off.
Mark, when this thing comes in we'll see what we have for dimensions. I have tried emailing you and Steve, but do not know if I am getting through.

Brian

Kalun D · 06-13-04, 01:18 PM

There's nothing off the shelf I've seen, especially in aluminum, that gets the belt back as far as possible. With the FMS short water pump there are pulleys available to fit but they stick out about one inch further than they need to.

With the coolant pipes going through the area, especially by the crank pulley it's very crowded, when I get to that point I'm going to be machining pulleys from billet.

Lynn · 06-13-04, 02:05 PM

Brian,

I designed a set for my serpantine setup w/AC and had a local shop fabricate them. I used a March crank pulley, T-bird waterpump pulley, Sanden short A/C compressor. The real trick was locating the Powermaster 160amp alternator. The pulley for the alt. clears the heatshield on the firewall by about 1/4". If you use one of the mini high amp alternators that are available now, if should be much easier to fit. I wanted the extra amps for the EFI system, the AC, readiator fans and all the lights I mounted (headlights, driving lights and foglights.) All this makes for a high amperage requirement, but the EFI is really the straw that brakes the camel's back. Unless you are putting in a very high rpm motor, I would suggest that you NOT underdrive the waterpump. That is why I chose the T-Bird pulley: if anything, it slightly over drives the waterpump.

Here is something that is VERY nice to know if you are using serpantine. What ever the length of the required belt turns out to be, if you can find that length with the proper number of ribs OR MORE, you can use a belt with more ribs and carefully trim off the excess ribs. I was informed by serveral manufacturers that these belts are produced with as many 200 ribs and then are cut to the desired width. The pulley that is usually the problematic one is the AC compressor pully. Mine only allows 4 ribs and I ended up cutting down a 6 rib belt to get the proper length.

Guys, I don't know if you've seen Kalun's website, but this guy is a shop wizard right up there with Merlin and Gahndalf. This man knows he can do some fantastic machine work. Kalun, I know you've probaly posted it elsewhere, but post it again so more of us mortals can marvel at your work!

Regards,
Lynn

Steve Toner · 06-13-04, 03:36 PM

Forgive my ignorance, guys, because I'm a V-belt kind of guy, but doesn't the water pump rotate the opposite direction in a serpentine setup? Which would mean that if you've bought a V-belt pump, you can't just change over to a serpentine belt without changing the pump?

It should be easy to get the alternator to line up, as spacers of any (positive) length are easy to make. Seems like you should be able to use a stock crankshaft pulley and a shorter water pump pulley. I'm not familiar with the Ford pulley kit (M-8509-N), but that's where I would start, since the water pump pulley is going to be the hardest thing to find. You don't mind having extra parts when you're done, do you? [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] But Kalun's comment about them sticking out an inch more than they need to bothers me - Kalun, are you talking about the belt location (per your prior sentence), or the overall length? I don't think you need to be too concerned about getting the belts back as far as possible (unless you have the ability to make your own pulleys, in which case go for it! [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img])

Lynn · 06-13-04, 05:42 PM

Steve, you are absolutely correct. Virtually all waterpumps that I have seen for sale, since around '90 anyway, will say if they are reverse rotation or stnadard. Obviously, one cannot rely on that being stated, so you have to ask.

Regards,
Lynn

PS: If I had it to do over, I may have gone with V-belts. It's a question any builder should seriously consider.

Kalun D · 06-14-04, 08:29 PM

Lynn,

""Guys, I don't know if you've seen Kalun's website, but this guy is a shop wizard right up there with Merlin and Gahndalf.""

Hey hey hey hey!! Don't exaggerate [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] I'm not a wizard or immortal, it's just long time experience in this line of work. I'm sure if you talked in depth about your occupation of software engineer I would be clueless.

Kalun D · 06-14-04, 08:52 PM

Steve,

""doesn't the water pump rotate the opposite direction in a serpentine setup?""

The FMS short water pump rotates normally.

""But Kalun's comment about them sticking out an inch more than they need to bothers me - Kalun, are you talking about the belt location (per your prior sentence), or the overall length?""

I'm talking the belt location front to rear, not length. With a scratch chassis I've got clearance problems in two areas.

First the front of the water pump where the pulley bolts. The firewall has a bulge to fit and the flange is pressed off machined and put back on in reverse for more clearance.

Secondly at the front of the crank and alternator pulleys. The coolant tubes come out of the tunnel and turn right in front of the crank pulley it's very close. The best set of off the shelf pulley's don't go as far back as possible by about one inch. I think this is to accommodate existing alternator brackets. The limiting factor is the ribs and outlet on the front of the water pump, the pulleys are about one inch away from these surfaces. This puts the crank pulley over one inch out from the balancer.

Fabricated pulleys will give over one inch more clearance at the front of the crank pulley.

Multi-groove belts don't perform that much better than V belts they just last longer because they bend easier.

Bill Musarra · 06-15-04, 09:39 AM

If any of you are the DIY types, I found an article on annodizing(?) aluminum parts yourself. Cheap and not expensive. Found it on another web site. Make them any color you want.
http://www.warpig.com/paintball/technical/anodize.shtml

Bill

Brian · 06-15-04, 01:02 PM

Thanks for the advice and observations guys, we'll evaluate the front end after we uncrate the thing and devise a plan of action.
Brian