454 serpentine belt not aligned to water pump pulley

Hey all -

I THINK I have an issue on the Burb. The serpentine belt is lined up awkwardly on the water pump pulley. It's lined up so far back on the pulley (towards the engine) that about 1/16" or so is actually hanging off the pulley.

Timeline:

1. Previous owner replaced water pump sometime in the last year
2. I bought the truck in October
3. I replaced the PS pump in November, and replaced both the belt and the alternator at the same time to alleviate some squealing noises. I have triple-checked the pulley on the PS pump to make sure it's aligned with the end of the pump shaft, even going so far as to re-rent the tool and run it down snug.
4. Started the truck a week ago and got some WEIRD clacking noises. Popped the hood, and the only thing obvious was the tensioner hopping with each clacking noise. I pulled the belt and inspected all pulleys. Nothing weird other than an idler pulley with bearings that felt a bit rough when spinning. Put the belt back on and it started squealing. Gave her a strong rev and it promptly ate the new belt. In fairness, I might have not had the belt completely aligned. Not sure.
5. Installed a new ACDelco idler pulley and tensioner, along with a Goodyear Gatorback belt. Fired it up and everything is marvelous (no noises!), but now I'm noticing the belt anomaly. The belt is also already showing some ... marking? (not sure how to describe it) on the back edge.

The belt is sitting dead-on in all the grooved pulleys and isn't sitting like this on either the idler or the tensioner. Pulleys all look to be in great condition, and nothing is wobbling. Other then the position on the WP pulley, everything looks totally OK.

So, do I have an issue? Where do your belts hit the pump pulley? Am I just being paranoid? If not, any ideas? I looked through some threads on how to replace the WP, and short of the pulley somehow not being completely bolted on to the pump, I'm not sure how/why it would be so off.

Mike

do you have a picture of the issue. there are long style pumps and short style pumps. i dont think that is the issue but the pulley could be wrong size. its my understanding there is a 5-5/8 and a 5-3/4 size pump in the short style depending on if its a big block or small block engine.

You said you replaced the p/s pump..
Is the p/s pulley on to far pulling the belt back a bit...

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magimerlin said:

You said you replaced the p/s pump..
Is the p/s pulley on to far pulling the belt back a bit...

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Click to expand...

Hmm... Good point. I was under the impression that the correct way is to push the pulley back far enough that the pulley is flush with the shaft (basically bottom out the install tool). But maybe i can walk it out a bit and help correct it. Just don't want it to affect the other grooved belts.

Mike

whiteboyslo said:

Hmm... Good point. I was under the impression that the correct way is to push the pulley back far enough that the pulley is flush with the shaft (basically bottom out the install tool). But maybe i can walk it out a bit and help correct it. Just don't want it to affect the other grooved belts.

Mike

Click to expand...

Every one is a bit different. I don't think I've had one that I ended up bottoming out yet to make it sit right. You can usually eyeball down the pulleys, looking from the side ofcourse, and line them all up and you'll see if one ain't in line good enough. But as the p/s pulley is the only adjustable one it's usually that one....

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magimerlin said:

Every one is a bit different. I don't think I've had one that I ended up bottoming out yet to make it sit right. You can usually eyeball down the pulleys, looking from the side ofcourse, and line them all up and you'll see if one ain't in line good enough. But as the p/s pulley is the only adjustable one it's usually that one....

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Click to expand...

Ha! That totally worked! Of course, I guess I shouldn't be all that surprised since it was the last thing I messed with, but still...

Thanks!

Mike

Your very welcome for the idea. Glad it got it fixed up for yah....

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There's an 89 3500 454 here in the yard...it runs and the belt isn't popping off, however I can see it is getting a little chewed up. There's a pic of the water pump to crankshaft pulley section of the belt. There's a small white speck in the pics. ThAts an ash that dropped off my cigarette. To the right of the white ash spot, you can see the belt is riding way high on the crankshaft pulley when it exits the water pump pulley. To the left side you can see almost a full groove the belt misses on the crankshaft pulley. It exits the crankshaft pulley lined up pretty good with the air pump.
Looks like the fan may have been replaced. Power steering pulley looks like it's been in the same place for a long time. It's exactly flush with the shaft.
Anyone come across this before? The water pumps isn't new but that doesn't mean it has never been changed. The truck is 30 years old.

I get the feeling there's a wrong part of pulley or something here. But this truck has run like this for years (not many miles in those years) before now having it looked at. Anyone have experience with this issue? Anyone else have an L19 to compare it with? I'm thinking it's something to do with the the water pump but I need to know why it's out of alignment before i can fix it.

I was thinking of tweaking the powers Steering pulley to try and line up the belt better but that doesn't seem to be the cause here. I think it's water pump positioning. Here's a pic top down where you can see the water pump -below the belt that travels between a/c compressor and belt tensioner - looks about 1/4"+ farther back towards the engine. The same direction the belt rides too far back that way on the crankshaft pulley.