This is the MCRParts.com archive. To get back to our main site, please follow this link: Ford MustangUnderdrive pully(Click here to view the original thread with full colors/images)Posted by: OldFart Most of us that are mod'ing our new mustangs have installed an aftermarket set of underdrive pullys. (and I'm no exception.) We wan't MORE HORSEPOWER, we want to GO FASTER. Like most novices, I bought into "freeing up horsepower" by "reducing the parasitic drag" of the stock crankshaft damper. After my personal experience with this, I have a couple of recommendations: 1. Don't buy the best deal you can find. The crank damper is protecting a very expensive piece of equipment - your engine. The best deal may very well not be doing enough to ensure you're not doing some serious damage. I'm not going to trash the manufacture I bought but suffice it to say they are one of the big brand names. 2. Read this technical brief by ATI Racing. It does a good job of explaining what is going on inside your engine in terms most people can understand (even me). It should be noted that this tech paper was not written by ATI, but my Steve Dinan of Dinan BMW. http://www.atiperformanceproducts.co...mper_dinan.htm If you've installed an aftermarket pully set, try this simple test. With the tranny in netural, have someon rev to around 5,000 - 6,000 rpm while you hold your hand on the intake. You'll be surprised at the amount of vibration the engine is making. Most of this is absorbed by the soft stock engine mounts, so you won't really feel it in the drivers seat, but the engine does feel it, and it's not a good thing. (I have prothane near rigid engine mounts, so I do feel it in the drivers seat.) (If you have the opportunity, do the same on an engine that has a stock damper as a comparison, I have and you will feel much less vibration.) In fear of trashing an engine that I've grown quite fond of, I plunked down some pretty serious bucks for the new ATI 05 Mustang damper. I may give up a few horsepower, but at least I'll have the comfort of knowing this won't be what does my engine in. This is the same company that makes all the Nascar race engine dampers so I think they know what they're doing. (and if I'm really lucky, I'll be able to hit 7,000 rpm without significant vibration, but that may be asking too much.) It should be about a week before I get it and have it installed. I'll post a follow-up and let you know how well it works. Live and learn, OldFart Posted by: ExBamaGal I don't have an 05/06 but I wanted to say thank you for your posts.They are always very informative! Posted by: Rick Sample Dang, that's making me think twice before I purchase any Underdrive pulleys! I might just have to get mine polished now instead! Posted by: OldFart Quote:
1. Many professional racers use ATI. But there are others out there. I'm told Fluid Damper has a great unit too but I don't think they have a 3 valve specific damper yet. 2. ATI does have an 05 Mustang 3 valve specific damper. No modifications to get it to fit. (But it ain't cheap - but it's a whole, whole lot cheaper than a sheared crankshaft and the resultant damage if that happens.) 3. My favorite tech who does nearly all the work on my car is a serious racer (2,600 hp, twin turbo, fox body - I'd say that was pretty serious) and he thinks the engine will be even faster with the ATI because with less vibration from the internals, it will wind-up even faster than it does now. It should be delivered tomorrow, but it will be next week before I can take the time to get it installed. I'll post a follow-up after driving it for about a week and getting it dyno'ed again. I did get the car dyno'ed today (I had already set the appointment 2 weeks ago). There is great joy in my Mustang land - see my Dyno post. OldFart Posted by: OldFart Quote:
The truth is, I'm learning about this stuff all the time. Unfortunately, my method appears to be one of trial and error - with emphasis on the error. So, if I can spend a few minutes making a post and save someone else the grief, my troubles (largely due to my inexperience) are not entirely a waste of my time and hard earned money and that makes me feel better. (So I guess you could say I do this for at least a partially self serving reason.) Thanks again, it's always good to hear from someone that your efforts are appreciated. OldFart Posted by: OldFart Quote:
Removed the (big brand name) set of underdrive pully's and installed the ATI Racing 05 Mustang specific crankshaft damper. This is a bit more involved than your usual pully install. You assemble the hub to the damper with 6 countersunk torx and 3 bolts, that are torqued to different values, with the usual loctite blue on everything. Then the whole afair is mounted on the crank and torqued to 120 ft/lbs. What makes the ATI unit unique is that the counterweight inside the damper doesn't set, until the first time the engine reaches 2,000 rpm and then it's good to go. Which means that the damper is setting itself to counteract the vibrations of the specific engine it's mounted on. Sounds like a good plan to me. As we all know, the 05 stang computer blips the throttle to around 2,200 rpm on start-up. Even so, I blipped it a few more times to around 3,000 and then to around 5,000 and decided it was time for a drive. Initially, the engine felt much smoother and from the seat of the pants, it felt like it was winding up faster. All was well - not so. Two miles later, check engine light on, in limp mode, won't rev over 3,500 and vibrating like hell at anything over 2,000. Thought the damper had come loose and checked, but everything was good and tight. Went to my favorite tuners shop (driving like granny as anything over 2,000 rpm resulted in massive vibration) and they ran the trouble codes: 1. Misfire on start-up. 2. Misfire on #2 cylinder 3. Misfire on #8 cylinder 4. Random Missfire. We cleared the codes and re-started, and they came right back at start-up. Cleared them again.......and it was like it had never happened. No vibration and engine running smooth as silk again. The tuner thinks the codes were logged by the computer at initial start-up and just took a few minutes to go into limp mode. Beyond that, neither ATI or my favorite tuner has any idea what the heck was going on. And unless it happens again (which I could live out the rest of my entire life without and be just fine) it will remain a complete mystery (unless someone else out there does this and has the same problems and feels like letting the rest of us know). But it's running great - for the moment. I'm justing keeping my fingers crossed and rubbing my lucky rabbits foot. I'll make one more post to this thread after I've had the car dyno'ed again and we'll see how this damper affected performance. OldFart Posted by: badass98svt i have March pulleys on my $V. had them for about 20k miles. no problems. not even charging. Posted by: OldFart Quote:
OldFart Posted by: OldFart Quote:
Never had the chance to get the car dyno'ed with the ATI crank damper installed because it continued to have problems with misfire. The problem was random and always occured at low rpm, at start-up or below 2,000 rpm. You would just be sitting at a red light and all of sudden the engine would have multiple and massive misfire, the check engine light would come on - and then it would clear up. After much discussion with ATI, they believed it was either something wrong with that particular damper, or the timing pick-up wasn't seeing the pully. Either way, they recommended sending the damper back to them. So, I had to remove it and re-install the underdrive pully set. Now I'm back where I started with a pully set that isn't protecting the crank from harmful vibrations. So, I called March and they have the new fuild damper for the 05 - but they are out of stock and don't know when they will have more in stock. I must not be living right. Maybe I need to sacrifice to the engine gods. OldFart Posted by: Mac Old Fart, Have you given Steeda a thought? They have a set for under $200. Kind of been with Ford for quite awhile, located down your way in Ponpano Beach. You think you have been having problems? I'm in the middle of swapping an Explorer 302 into a 2000 4x4 Ranger and am finding out all the little things different in the different years of OBD11 that really cause problems (throwing money at the project). Mac - another old fart - first Ford was a '64' Mercury Cyclone 4-speed Posted by: OldFart Quote:
1. In my opinion, they are sticking it to everyone on the prices for their 05 parts. They call it "research and development" costs, but I call it what it is, charging far more than a reasonable or even high mark-up, just because they were first in the market with a particular item. So, I only buy their parts when they are the only ones that have it. And I pay the price, but damn if I'm going to use their parts for anything that I can get elsewhere, just as a matter of principle. 2. They don't actually manufacture the vast majority of their parts. The parts are built elsewhere using design spec's developed by Steeda. These same companies then quietly sell the same part to others and the part is marketed under another brand name. And since their crank pully looks exactly like the same underdrive crank pully I already have (and I very much suspect it is the same crank pully), I don't believe it will do any better of a job of reducing the crankshaft harmonic vibrations than the one I'm trying to replace. At this point, I'm hoping that ATI will be able to solve the problem and I can re-install their damper, as I still believe they make the very best unit available at any price, with a close runner-up being the Flluid Damper unit. I've been tempted to give the Saleen damper a try, but even I am put off at paying nearly $700 for a pully set as I suspect a few hundred of that price involves having the name Saleen on it. OldFart Posted by: badass98svt old fart, while steeda prices may be high, they are the ONLY company who actually swaps info. with Ford. Ford actually gives Steeda any info they ask for, and vice versa. as far as saleen goes...do you think Saleen makes its own parts? not to mention their quality is terrible.there quality has decreased over the years. i would buy Steeda parts over Saleen's any day of the week. Posted by: OldFart For those of you who have followed this thread, you already know about my problems with the installation of an ATI crank damper. It turns out the entire problem is related to an insignificant looking stainless spacer that is installed on the crankshaft first, prior to mounting the damper. (The install instructions clearly indicate you should caliper the stock unit and use the spacer if needed to maintain the measurements of the stock unit - well we did and it is needed.) The spacer is slightly smaller than the bearing surface of either the stock damper or the ATI damper (both the stock and the ATI unit have the exact same bearing surface area). This smaller face surface (about 4 mm diameter less) allowed the timing pick-up wheel, which is just a stamped metal wheel mounted on the crank, to deform under high centrifigal load. In other words, at high rpm, it spun itself out of shape and warped. Leading to the problems with misfire. At first, it appeared that ATI was going to "pay for the repair" (because that's what they said on the phone). Now, that has been twisted to "replace the part at no charge, because the problem must have been caused by the installer". Needless to say, I'm somewhat less than impressed. So for now, I'm out a little over $1,200.00 (cost of the ATI damper plus cost of re-installing stock damper, plus cost of repair once we figured out what the problem was). I'm back to the stock damper, awaiting delivery of a March fluid damper (which is currently out-of-stock), or the replacement ATI spacer of the correct size - whichever comes first. (and spending some more money getting it installed once it arives.) That was money I intended to spend on finalizing the suspension upgrades, so I'm not terribly happy about that either. Live and learn, OldFart Posted by: traffic142 Well, the price has come down on the steeda pulleys. They like march are SFI approved. As tempermental as the '05 seem to be, the steeda run fine on my car. We have all seen the high prices on the new mustang parts. As you can see the prices are coming down a little. Posted by: OldFart Quote:
As to my damper problem: March now has a fluid damper for the crank (very reasonably priced I might add) and I just received it last week. I supose that will be my next attempt. I'll make a follow-up post. I have to agree that those parts I've purchased from Steeda appear to be good quality and more importantly, they work without problem. Which is more than I can say for some other manufacturers. I seems that many aftermarket manufacturers are rushing to cash in on the popularity of the 05, without doing the necessary R&D and beta testing to identify secondary problems that may be caused by their parts. Along those same lines, I'm disturbed by the magazine articles that promote the benefits of an aftermarket part, without a word on other changes that will be necessary if you actually install the subject parts. The most grusome example of this is the multitude of articles on installing lowering springs, that say nothing about the fact that if you do this, you will also need an adjustable panhard rod (to re-center the rear end) and some means of adjusting the either the lower or upper control arms (to re-set the pinion angle). I think this is terribly irresponsible and is a clear example of selling out loyal readers just to get some advertising dollars. (Do you really think they get nothing for those wonderful "Tech" articles? As a minimum, the manufacturer is obliged to purchase a larger ad in the magazine.) Ok, I'll get off my soapbox. OldFart Posted by: dustindu4 I have the Steeda, which will be installed in the next 4 weeks. They go for $200 and if you don't need the water pump pulley like me, they will sell you just the harmonic balancer. Those went for $150 back when their set went for $250. Posted by: lbf03roush2 You and all of your fantastic information is exactly why I am on this site. Keep up the posts, they are greatly appreciated! Posted by: schmitty i have steeda pulleys. they were installed at about 850 miles. i have almost 7k and no problems and car runs great... Posted by: MikeM I Have The Steeda Also And Love It. Ford Mustang Archive Home | General Tech | 5.0 Mustang Tech | 4.6 Mustang Tech | 3.8 Mustang Tech | 2.3 Mustang Tech | Classic Mustang Tech | Appearance and Sound | Virtual Body Shop | Initiation | The Lounge | The Showroom | Site Suggestions | Mustang Talk | 2005 Ford Mustang | Ford Lightning | Racers Bench | For Sale | Wanted To Buy | Northeast | SouthEast | Central | MidWest | West Coast | NEBOC
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