accesory pulley question

[sam74]

what does the farthest drivers side highest pulley power? My bearings seem to be going out and making a racket when starting and not spinning but after a warm up it does start spinning with a reduced racket. I thought it might be the water pump but I believe I am mistaken as the water pump is covered in my haynes manual and on this forum but is more centrally located and lower than the pulley in question from what I can tell in the pictures. I was searching youtube videos and saw one that said it was the AC but I'm not sure it was an Astro video. Thanks for any help and advice in advance.

[97cargocrawler]

If you have AC then its the AC pump. If you dont have AC then there will just be a pulley there. Below that is the power steering pump.

Sent from my tachyonic antitelephone

[sam74]

Thanks for the confirmation. I popped the hood today while it was still daylight and fired her up to let it warm and then checked below the van for a wet spot. No wet spot so I'm assuming it is not the water pump. The racket is pretty loud when cold and just started and hard to tell where it comes from exactly but quiets when warm and it seems to be the AC pump then.

Again thanks. I'll search on the forum for AC pump threads and if I have no luck I'll get back on for more questions/advice.

[RECox286]

Best way to check for pulley problems, is to remove the belt. You can't feel bad bearings with

the belt tensed in place. After the belt is off tension (removed) you can manipulate every pulley

as a separate entity. Rock the pulley in and out, as well as in rotation and you will find the fox

in the henhouse, dollars to dougnuts.

Good hunting

Uncle Bob

[Leeann_93]

Moved to Engines

[sam74]

Hello everyone,

Thanks for previous advice. I decided to get the bypass AC pulley and the shortened belt and am in the middle of tinkering with the van. Finally got a nice day after work 60+ degrees and no rain at the moment.

I have removed the air intake and the upper fan shroud and the serpentine belt and am checking pulleys.

Question: Is the lowest most pulley or drive/engine pulley (I think) supposed to rotate freely like the others?

I hope not.

[sam74]

Okay just did a quick google search since I only have about an hour and a half of day light left and apparently no it shouldn't spin easily anyway.

Sorry, just trying to get her done while it is nice outside.

Back to work!

[Lumpy]

I'm a little cloudy on the picture.

First off, different year and different style vans had accessories on different sides and places. On my 89, ALTERNATOR is on the upper driver side. A/C compressor is on the upper passenger side. I think(?) all of them had the power steering pump at lower driver side.

Googling some pics of A/C compressors and Alternators should clarify things very quickly. Or just look them up in your favorite online auto parts store website.

The bottom most LARGEST pulley is the crank. It doesn't spin freely. It's connected to all your pistons and the gazillion pound iron crank shaft.

The A/C, if that's what's giving you problems, has a clutch on it's pulley. When your A/C is not turned on, the outer part of the pulley spins freely. The bearings in the compressor don't come into play. So I think(?) if you can spin the A/C pulley (with the belt off) it's not a problem.

The ALTERNATOR, if that's what's giving you problems, obviously has to turn any time the engine is on.

Except to give you a little more room, I've never really understood the desire to delete the A/C compressor and replace it with a free spinning pulley. When the A/C isn't on it IS a free spinning pulley.

But if your clutch is bad, then replacing it with the free spinner makes more sense. Unless you live anywhere where it gets above 80 degrees.


Lump

[sam74]

Dang, I just spent a few minutes on a longer post that didn't make it through the old internet. User error I suppose. I'll try it again.

It is/was definitely the AC pulley or some part of it in the upper drivers side area. My alternator is upper passenger side. Originally it appeared like the AC pulley was not spinning at all but did begin to spin a while back. Sounded like bearing noise to me. And the metal square or rectangular thing in front of the pulley would also make noise when it spins. I thought that must have something to do with when the AC is running.

Back when I originally posted on March 25 it was too cold and I had no where to work on the van inside. So once or twice a week I would start her up and let her idle and warm up which seem to lessen the noise and I would drive into town about 6 miles for some recreation.

After a while I noticed the power steering howling and the break getting spongy. I got a slightly warm day after work and replenished the fluids in both those and that seemed to help these additional noises. I figured the AC bearing not spinning as it should must have been causing these other accessory pulleys to work harder and use those fluids.

So about two weeks or so ago I was starting her up to let her idle to take to town and I had what I thought was an engine knock that would not go away when warm. So I decided to park her until I get the AC stuff and hopefully not tax another important accessory pulley that might cause this sound and do major damage. Maybe oil pump? I've had a similar knock on cold days that would go away in a minute or so that I attributed to cold and less viscous oil.

So anyway I got the warm and dry day today and got the parts a week ago. Everything went smoothly. I did notice my idler pulley has some bearing noise and will need replacing in the near future. I also notice that the power steering pulley did not spin near as freely as the other pulleys. I wonder if this is usual or not?

Only problems I had were trying to get the rubber grommets back into the air intake. Any advice on that?

Van started up fine but I still had the engine (or something) knocking. I felt a little better having added the AC delete pulley so I took her for a spin and the knocking did go away, hopefully for ever.

Again thanks for the help and maybe someone can use this thread for future information like I have used several others here myself.

[RECox286]

If the bottom most pulley spins freely, then it is like a clock that strikes 13. (Time for a new clock.)

You get the drift ?

Uncle Bob