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V-belt to Serpentine

Posted: Wed May 14, 2014 8:36 pm
by SquirrelCrusher
I am trying to bring my 1980 Camaro out of the dark ages a little bit and wanted to go from the old bulky v-belts to a serpentine belt.

I bought the brackets and accessories off the internet and earlier this week went about removing all the V-belt stuff.

When I went to see what else I needed to move, I ran into a slight problem. My old SBC heads are missing a hole to bolt the serpentine brackets to.

Crappy cell phone pictures, but the passenger side head only have 1 mounting hole on it and the bracket needs 2 holes.
Image

Anyone know of a way to correct this issue. Would I be better off just getting new heads or buying an aftermarket belt setup that doesn't bolt to the heads?

Posted: Wed May 14, 2014 9:13 pm
by mattawajeep
Any reason you want to get rid of the v-belts? They're still pretty easy to find, and it's not that hard to simply carry a spare.

You adding AC or something?

Posted: Wed May 14, 2014 10:19 pm
by White trash
mattawajeep wrote:You adding AC or something?



It already has ac although it was equipped with one of the biggest piece of crap compressors known to man. :lol:

Serpentine belts stay put at higher rpm while V belts like to jump off any time you go above 5k rpm unless you have deep groove pulleys and a bit of luck.

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 5:35 am
by SquirrelCrusher
I just want to clean up the engine a bit. V belts setup has bulky brackets everywhere. Not visually appealing. The AC compressor is HUGE and seized up. So I figured I could swap to the serpentine belt to make it look a bit cleaner and get the smaller ac compressor.

I am also going to put a TPI intake on it and got the tpi serpentine brackets to go with it.

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 10:37 am
by SquirrelCrusher
Anyone know if that I can just bolt it on with 1 bolt on the head instead for 2? The bracket uses 2 bolts on the head and 2 bolts at the bottom on the engine. So will 3 bolts hold it together?

Because that would be the easiest and cheapest "fix."

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 10:46 am
by SquirrelCrusher
March Performance "Economy" belt system is $1573. Don't think I will go with that option. :down

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 11:37 am
by Lurch
SquirrelCrusher wrote:Anyone know if that I can just bolt it on with 1 bolt on the head instead for 2? The bracket uses 2 bolts on the head and 2 bolts at the bottom on the engine. So will 3 bolts hold it together?

Because that would be the easiest and cheapest "fix."


You can give it a try. I think it should hold ok.
Whatcha doing with all the old a/c brackets? I have been looking for some so I can work on getting a/c in the chevelle.

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 1:06 pm
by SquirrelCrusher
I was planning on letting then sit outside my garage for a few years before getting tired of looking at them and tossing them into the trash. So you are welcome to them once I get this stuff put back together and working.


A guy in Benton City rebuilds heads and sells them at PAW for $175 a side. That is another option to get some cheap heads.

I want to get my car back together for Dayton days. So I would prefer not swapping heads. If I can avoid it for now.

Posted: Thu May 15, 2014 6:24 pm
by SquirrelCrusher
I bolted the brackets on today. They seem to not have any play so tomorrow I will work on getting the accesories all mounted and a new water pump put on. Hopefully this will get my back on the road for All Wheels Weekend and maybe a couple other car shows this summer.

Drilling and tapping wont work, checked an extra head I have and it woud hit an intake bolt within about 1/4in from the front.

Posted: Fri May 16, 2014 9:30 pm
by SquirrelCrusher
Hopefully this weekend I will get the car running again. The brackets are bolted on and seem pretty sturdy. 3/4 bolts on the passenger side and 4/5 on the drivers side.


Anyone know of a show that can make new A/C lines from scratch?

Posted: Fri May 16, 2014 9:36 pm
by Lurch
I think napa in Pasco can. Not positive tho