I am in the middle of moving my race car to the 20b and it is time to figure out the pulleys. Right now I am looking at the Gilmer kit but was not sure if that have had an issues on 20b running them in 'race' conditions.

Can anyone running the Gilmer kit report back on the results after having them on the car a while? Especially if in race conditions?

My goal is to have VERY reliable pulley setup for race conditions, that includes high rpm, longevity, and function...so this setup looked like the solution, but I was hoping to get some real world reports to validate this.


Also, is http://www.rotary-works.com/ the only place I can get them?

 

I have heard that they can also cause premature engine bearing failure... Plus they are crazy loud...

 

I am pretty sure the 20b pump runs the same direction of the pulley (opposite of the FD water pump), so the gilmer setup actually matches the 20b fine in that respect.

 

hey J2LA :-)

Although I appreciate the post, I do not what to know about what people have 'heard' but what users of it have actually experienced first hand.

On the noise:
I am not worried about the noise, trust me there are things louder on my race car ;-)

On the premature bearing failure:
Actually this can happen with any pulley kit and is usually not the pulley, but user error, they do not tension the belts correctly and can overstress the bearing with lateral tension. However, I would be curious to hear more on this if anyone has encountered it first hand, in a case where the belt tension was correct and it seemed a result of the pulley setup.

 

Ok, so maybe I am confused, I am not sure any of what you posted applies to my situation, did you read my post above on the 20b water pump direction?

Maybe I am wrong, but the 20b does not need the modified setup shown in that link you provided, as the 20b water pump moves in the same direction as the main pulley, thus the belt runs on the outside like normal, not ont he inside like it would need to on an FD because and FD water pump runs the other direction.

So a standard gilmer kit like this one:
http://www.rotary-works.com/mm5/merc...gory_Code=PULY

..should work fine with a 20b keeping the 20b water pump setup.


Am I missing somthing here or wrong on the 20b water pump rotation direction?

 

13Bs prior to the FD chassis run a regular V-belt system.

13Bs after the FD chassis run a serpentine belt system.

The serpentine belt system uses a slim, multiple grooved belt. The belts friction surface can be on the grooved side or the smooth side.

The V-belt system is like one giant single groove, and the friction surface is almost always on the grooved side of the belt.

The pre FD system had grooved pulleys to accept the V-belt on the alternator, water pump, and main pulleys.

The FD system used a smooth surface pulley for the water pump, and has a multiple groove alternator pulley and main pulley. The belt is used on the grooved side for the alternator and main pulley, while the belt is driving the waterpump on the backside of the belt (the smooth side), causing the pump to spin backwards as opposed to if it had a grooved pulley.

So if you use an FD water pump it must be with a serpentine belt system and a smooth pulley must be used in order for it to spin in the correct direction.

You can use the the gilmer drive with any 13B water pump prior to the FD series stuff, because all the gilmer drive pulleys are grooved (tooth style), which is similar to the v-belt system.

 

It can. The tops of the bearings in the front stationary gears will show much greater wear on motors with belts that are way too tight. The opposite side (the bottom) will show minimal wear. I have two front stationary gears, off of engines with dual belt alternator pullies, that show this wear.

 

I was test driving a customer's car when a Gilmer alternator pulley decided to fail. The mounting face cracked allowing the pulley to wobble out of control and shred the belt. Was it installation error? Possibly, the car came in with them installed..

I will not use them.

 

Have you considered running an EWP?
That way you'll have better cooling capacity and only have to drive the alternator off the e-shaft.

 

Yep, and we may goto that next season, but for now just staying with the stock water pump setup.

 

Damian,

I ran some gilmer pulleys on my 20B. They were from tweakit.net. I put very few miles on my setup, and I could foresee that they would not be very long-lived.

If you look at them, you'll see that the alternator pulley is the only thing the "trues" the belt. ANY misalignment of the pulleys (which I view as inevitable) will result in one side of the belt rubbing on the plate on the alternator pulley that keeps it in-line. Consequentially, fraying occurs in relative short order.

Now, it could be that I'm just a moron that can't install pulleys, but I don't think that they're well-designed for actual usage.

Looking forward to progress on your build.
Good luck!
-ryan

 

Thanks for the info Ryan, this is the kind of real world info I am looking for.

 

Look at Speedsource and their setups.

 

Can you provide links, a reason why, or somthing more? Just saying 'look at speedsource' with nothing else is a bit of an empty comment?

 

I have been running one on my "street legal" drag car for about 10k miles.

While the car is louder with them installed I can say that it takes less tension to keep it from slipping as it would with a v belt. This would be beneficial for the bearing as it gets less of a side load on it.

I shreadded 4 v-belts at under 10k rpm. Once I installed the gilmer I got it to do an 11,200RPM dyno pull and not a single problem.

Hope this helps.
Jesus

 

Ryan I couldn't agree more. The alt pulley is the only pulley that "guides" the belt and no matter what tension I set the belt to, or how I positioned the alt, the belt always rode against the forward "guide" of the alt pulley and frayed the belt.

They sounded cool as ****, and looked great, but I might not use them again, unless I get a really good deal on them.

 

I know of two guys up here runnin gilmer pulleys on there 20b's with no issues. One is a kit from xtreme rotaries and the other is from rotary woks. Both seem to work well, and no issues with belts. Imo the xtreme kit seems to have a better fit and finish.....

Im still deciding on which route to take, but the gilmer makes sense to me

 

Old Post But I Had ordered A Set From Rotary Works & It Was A Joke. Only Pulley That Seem To be good was the crank pulley. The Water Pump & Alternator Pulleys Wobbled Like The Pulleys Where Warp Or Something. Messaged Them Send Videos Of Me Spinning The Pulleys they have yet to reply to me about this. & The Belt Was To Small. So Im Going To Try My Luck With Xtreme Rotaries Kit.



Keiron

 

update: I am not going to use the gilmer type pulleys for my 20 setup. I will be using standard V belt style pulleys.