Serpentine drive setup?

[Project1970]

Alright, I know this has been posted at least twice in relatively recent history...but at the moment I'm too toasted (a friend of mine passed away last night, at the age of 19...his leukemia came back in the past month and he took a severe turn for the worse yesterday at noon...got my butt up to Phoenix as fast as I could to say goodbye and just now got back ) to go digging through the board without search to find the posts.

I know someone posted some pictures of using a newer truck's accesory brackets. That sounds good to me; especially seeing as I have Vortec heads, I would imagine '96-up brackets would work well...would there be any problems with the '70 block?

I also have factory power steering and air. Are pulleys available to retrofit those to serpentine or am I going to have to replace the compressor and pump? (Not a huge deal but those may make/break when I do this).

Would it be a good time to convert to a newer alternator as well? Maybe just get a '96-up truck alternator to match? Or could I still use my original alternator?

Thanks for any help / suggestions, guys. I ask because my A/C belt snapped today before I even got on the 10 to head down, so that was 110mi without A/C...and I hate having to do the power steering belt just to get to the damn thing!!!

[dmec]

look at it this way. you threw an a/c belt but were able to drive home. although misserable in 114 deg weather. with a serpentine you are screwed, hitchiking in 114 deg weather.

[Chevy Wrench]

Sorry to hear of your friends passing, my condolences. As far as your problem, unfortunately I think your gonna have to change everything over to the ribbed pulley design, ie; alt, a/c compressor, power steering pump, crank shaft pulley and waterpump. Also, Im not sure, but if I remember right, the brakets bolt to the head, not the block. But I could be wrong.... By the way, I was born and raised in Tucson, moved away a little over 2 years ago. Let me tell ya, I dont miss the heat, but sure miss the food. Good luck.
John


One more thing, I have never seen or heard of a serpintine belt breaking or being "slung off". I have seen a/c compressors lock up and not let the engine turn over, they are incredibly strong. If you have all of the pulleys aligned, you will have no problems. And it will be a good time to convert over to R134a, since you will have to use the newer style a/c compressor anyway. Just my 2 cents worth.

[Project1970]

I've never seen a serpentine belt break - the only problem I've ever seen with one is the idler pulley on my sister's Saturn SL1 went out, and it has 109,000 miles on it...and even if something were to break, I COULD fix it on the road and not worry about it again...serpentine belts are EASY when you have the room. My V-belts are, however, not; that damn P/S belt is a two-person job with the truck jacked up.

Forgot about the water pump, but I do remember now that I'll need one with the reverse rotation.

If this ends up going well I may have a full set of bracketry up for sale.

[Classic Heartbeat]

I have seen serpentine belts come apart at the seams... It happed to me in our motorhome driving accross the country. When it happened the reminents of the belt was under all of the pullies and gave us problems the rest of the trip. Burned up 2 more belts before we got all of the reminents cleared. Major expence in a motorhome, because getting easy access to the front of the motor is impossible. Which explains why it took so long to get all of the pieses. I think that they are a great idea on motors that have easy access to the front just in case something goes wrong, but not otherwise. At least with the old belt system you will not loose everything when you loose a belt. That was also the bad part out in the middle of nowhere on the road!! WES www.ClassicHeartbeat.com

[Mike C]

If you have AC and need a new compressor AC, a power steering rebuild and want to upgrade to a CS130 alternator, the GM performance parts catalog has a complete serpentine setup for $699. You can always go junk yard, but if you have to buy that stuff can get expensive. The kit comes with AC compressor, alternator, power steering pump, long water pump, all of the brackets, bolts, idler, and belt. Considering CS130 alternators are $300 new as well as AC compressors, the kit is a great deal.

If you want to go junkyard, just about any 4.3, 5.0, 5.7 serpentine setup should work fine. Pick yours based on what alternator and AC compressor you want to run. The car setups are a little different from the truck ones. A Camaro setup is needed if you want to clear TPI, the truck idler is in a different location.

[Project1970]

I'm not worried about clearing a TPI; the TPI baseplate alone for my Vortec heads is nearly $300! If/when I go fuel injected, it will probably be a custom TBI setup on an RPM Air Gap Vortec manifold...

And that kit sounds like a steal all things considered, now that I've started adding everything up...too bad it's way out of my range

[Zeus]

Yeah, my experience with serpentine belts is they break down in strands not completely. So you will hear a metal clinking in the engine and it will be time to change it. It is extemely easy to change versus the v-belts. How about a serpentine system for a big block? Could you do the same thing from a donor car?

[DirtyLarry]

You fellas breaking serpentine belts must have bad luck. I converted my 78 K10 to a 1995 C/K serp system back in 1996 and have never had a problem. Recently I just swapped in a 454 HO with 2000 model year L29 big block serp brackets. From my experience in being a National Fleet Service Manager for an auto manufacturer and I have yet to hear any of my fleet customers that have late model trucks having problems with belts breaking. Back in the late 80’s there were belt tensioner problems that smoked a lot of alternator bearings but those days are long gone and serp belts are the best way to go. V-belts have a special place in history right along with breaker ignition distributors and carburetors.

My old small block with 1995 brakets

[DirtyLarry]

Recently installed 454HO with L29 brackets