All,

My issue has gotten ridiculous as of late. I have a 2V 351C installed with a C6 in my 1978 F-150. I got the block years ago at a machine shop, and cobbled together the rest from junk yards and E-bay. The truck no longer has A/C, so just alternator and power steering. From about 2500 rpms and up, something up front starts chirping then develops into a full on belt squeal noise.

I know that these can stem from deflections in the brackets, but I feel confident I've got everything in place as it should be. I tightened the P/S pump too tightly (with a brand new Gates belt) a couple of weeks ago and ended up killing the pump bearing, so it's been replaced with a remanufactured pump. The fan clutch spins more freely than a new one I tried at O'Reilly the other day and I just spent the last couple of hours replacing what I thought had to be the problem: the water pump. Just got back from a road test and it's as noisy as it was before swapping pumps. The alternator also spins freely and is charging as it should.

I can make it squeal in park under the hood and to me it sounds like it's coming from either the water pump or crankshaft pulley area rather than the alternator or P/S pulley.

I'll gladly take any advice or experiences you'd be willing to share, it's making me NUTS.

Thanks!

Bob

 

Start the engine with the alternator belt removed, that will definitely tell you if it's that device or not.

Can do the same with other belts, too.

 

Makes sense, I'll see if I can figure out if it's one or the other tomorrow. Thanks!

 

OK, looks like it's the power steering/fan/water pump belt and that it's coming from the crank pulley or water pump pulley. Is there anyone who might have a pic of a correctly installed p/s pump and brackets. Looking at my p/s pump pulley, the belt seems to be higher on one side than the other, almost like it goes through at a small angle instead of flush. If you don't have a pic, my question really is what goes between the back of the pump bracket and the head itself. On mine (again, junk yard sourced), the long bolt on top of the bracket goes through the bracket itself and has a nut as a spacer between the bracket and the head, should there be a spacer like the one between the alternator and the other head?

Thanks!

Bob

 

Yes, there should be a spacer, it's approximately 3/4" (or 20mm) thick.

Here's what mine looks like:

 

Ah, that spacer looks quite a bit thicker than the nut I have in there. I've got an extra alternator spacer I can cut down to 3/4"...thanks! Yours looks like an M-block bracket, but the space on the A/C bracket must have been the same. I'll do some wrenching this afternoon and let you know what I find.

Thanks again,

Bob

 

Well, it sounds different, but it's still chirping. I found my old A/C iron base plate and bracket. I used the iron piece to measure the right thickness for my spare alternator spacer and cut it down...they're almost identical in thickness. Eyeballing the belt from the water pump to the p/s pulley, it looks straighter, but it still appears that the p/s pulley is SLIGHTLY in front of the water pump pulley. I guess I could keep chipping away at the spacer until the belt looks like it's traveling straighter, but that would place me where I was when all of this started, about the thickness of the nut I had in there as a spacer.

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Any other ideas? The pulleys look shiny down in the groove, so I think it's clean metal against a brand new belt at this point. Frustrating...

Thanks again,

Bob

 

Get a decent straight edge of some kind, ruler, decent piece of steel stock etc and see if you can line it up against the edges of the pulleys. They may be close in line but this will also show if the pulleys are kicked/crooked in some way. old school fitting

 

Good thinking. My straight edge says that the PS pump is ahead of the water pump (like the pic seems to indicate) but also that the PS pump is pointed slightly toward the passenger side of the truck with respect to the water pump.

Now I wonder if my bracket is not a little fatigued and/or bent due to being forced back against the smaller spacer. I suppose I could remove the bracket, put it in the vice and see if I can bash/bend it until it lines the pump up a little better with the other pulleys?

Kinda makes me wonder how customizers deal with engineering whole cars when I can't make factory parts play nice with each other.

Thanks!

Bob

 

Oh yeah, now I'm wondering if I pressed the old pulley far enough onto the PS pump when I replaced it a few weeks back. FYI, the belt noise was an issue before and after r/r'ing the pump.

Bob

 

When engineers are doing it there process factors in lining everything up. Using old stuff and assuming it is ok (we've all done it) when it's not because it's bent, not bolted up correctly or has a washer/spacer missing burns you more often than most care to admit. Usually takes a DOH moment to wake up. It's when you do it more than once and don't learn from it you need old good slappin'!!

 

Amen. The newest Cleveland is now 37 years old, so are it's stamped brackets. Just looking for a way to not buy a $500+ March bracket setup for my $500 truck. Still bothers me to death when you see a rat rod/beater with a SBC and high mounted accessories on home-made brackets and 6-foot belts that actually work!!!

I'm going to drive my '06 truck to get a burrito and let the Ford simmer while I think about what to do next.



Thanks again,

Bob

 

I thought id throw my guesses into the ring.

Are all the effected pulleys in their original height and orientation, your pics look different from the ones ctubutis posted though I assumed it was a difference in year. If if any changes reduced the amount of belt contact surface around each pulley or the angle of pull on the pulleys perhaps the belt just can't get a good enough grip on the pulleys to do its job.

My other guess was a problem or obstruction somewhere else in the power steering system that is putting too high a load (like when the wheel is held full one way or another) on the pump and causing slip, the squeal may be coming from the water pump or more likely the crank, but that isn't necessarily the problem pulley, the pump may just not want to turn and it has a better grip on the belt than the others so when the crank keeps turning they slip instead. I can't see anything causing the water pump to resist turning that much (aftermarket huge fan?), so id suspect the power steering.

 

Thanks for posting F1, sorry for the delay. The pic differences are that mine's a 351C and his is a 351M or 400. The brackets are very different, but the water pump and its pulley are the same on both motors.

As I said in the first post, the water and p/s pumps are both new (less than 5 months) and spin freely and the fan clutch is good. I really think the alignment is the issue as evidenced by how the straight edge I used didn't line up very well between the water pump pulley and the p/s pump pulley. I'm going to get excited enough about it to brave the Texas heat and try to do some aligning myself before looking at other possible issues.

 

Now that you have changed things and got things aligned right have you deglazed the belts ? Take a good metal file and carefully, with the engine running touch it to the belts sides till you get the glaze off of them.