steeda pulleys

[Big Top GT]

Here's a post that talks about my ATI Balancer. I talk a little bit about the problem with a small diameter pulley at the bottom.

http://forums.corral.net/forums/showthread.php?t=872455&highlight=pully

This one is the goldmine of techincal wealth. You get some really heavy hitters in the Mustang community to talk about the small diameter problem. I think EDO was a ford engineer.

http://forums.corral.net/forums/showthread.php?t=811587&highlight=balancer

Hope this helps,
Alan

 

[NastyStang113]

Here we go again ...

 

[red05bullitgt]

Basically, they're not designed to dampen harmonic imbalances in the crank outside a narrow range. When you get some RPM in the motor the crank and oil pump gears make contact, resulting in shattered oil pump gears.Alan

Perhaps that may hold true concerning other aftermarket pulleys, however as for Steeda UDP's are concerned. That is absolutely 100% inaccurate, and is complete rubbish.

Before purchasing my Steeda pulley's, I did intensive research on both the Steeda website, and also spoke with several of their tech support reps about their harmonic balancer specs. In which they confirmed word for word, they're product description.


Product Details
Steeda's is the leader in underdrive pulley design for the 4.6L engines. Steeda was the first to achieve SFI approval on our underdrive pulleys for all 4.6L engines. Our underdrive pulleys are the only pulleys engineered through our unique partnership in Ford's technology transfer program to have the proper torsional vibration dampening characteristics for your 4.6L engine. No other manufacturer can make this claim.


That being said, I've been running my Steeda pulleys nearly 2 years, and haven't experienced a single issue whatsoever. In addtion, they're also factory equipped on the Steeda Q 350 Mustang exclusively !!!

 

[Big Top GT]

I'm not looking to get into a pissing match, but I'll leave you with a few quick thoughts.

1. You called Steeda and talked to them about how great a Steeda balancer is. I think that's what I'd consider a "biased" source of information.

2. What kind of power does your car make? It's pretty clear you didn't read any of the attached threads. If you did, you woudl have seen this:

Ed (EDO) was the lead engineer on the '00 R 5.4 engine team and has covered the negative effect of uncontrolled harmonic vibration several times.

And this (see post number 9):

http://forums.corral.net/forums/showthread.php?t=475554

3. I'm glad you did your internet research, but it doesn't change the fact that one of the posters in the above threads was an Engineer on the Cobra R team.

Unfortunately, I have this same conversation with my 11 year old son when he tries to defy the laws of physics.

I find myself saying, "no matter how much you like something, or how much you want things to be a certain way, hoping doesn't change the facts."

I'm out.

A~

 

[red05bullitgt]

And while were're at it, I'll leave you with a few of my thoughts.

1. I read the posts you attached from Corral.net, in which the oil pump failures resulted from aftermarket crankshaft pulleys, that did NOT have harmonic balancers which were properly tuned. Where as the Steeda Pulleys are both properly tuned, and balanced.

2. Not only did I contact Steeda, but also got recommendations from many 2005-07 Mustang owners that are long time members of The Mustang Source website, and also from Brenspeed before deciding to purchase them for my car.


3. As for being biased towards Steeda is concerned, you're damn right I'm biased, and here's why. I select nothing but the very best quality products for my car, in which I know that Steeda R&D their products, before selling them to their customers.

In addition, I also know their safe because of the fact they're engineered through their exclusive partnership in Ford's technology transfer program to have the proper torsional vibration dampening characteristics for the 4.6L engine. That alone is good enough reason for me.


4. As for how much power they made, just check out the dyno sheet thread, and you'll see for yourself, that my car got 10 additional HP from the Steeda UDP's.


5. As for the facts, why is that not a single person on this website has claimed they've had oil pump failures, in which were directly related to Steeda UDP's ???

I don't know about you, but I sure know my facts are accurate !

 

[Big Top GT]

This is why I all but stopped posting on internet forums. No matter what facts, or who supports them, if a person wills themself to believe something then the facts simply cease to matter.

You're not arguing with me over this. You're arguing with a Ford engineer and a guy that some would argue is one of the best in the business when it comes to building a modular engine.

Once, and again, asking the company that manufactures a product, an aftermarket company that does NOT employ actual engineers on their staff (and I'm not talking about Steeda, here), and other "members of a website" are not 100% credible sources.

The small diameter "balancer" (Made by Steeda or most anyone else) isn't designed to work outside the typical RPM range. Once you go outside that range of RPM, or are making significantly more HP than stock, it's causing the problem.

The fact still remains that if you look at the crank on those who lost oil pumps, you'll find two things: witness marks where the oil pump gears made contact with the crank due to uncontrolled harmonic vibration, and shattered oil pump gears.

People, like yourself, who don't know what they're looking for have all been blaming the oil pump gears. They put in hardened OP Gears which covers up the problem, it does not resolve it.

So, just because noone complains about it, doesn't mean it's not the root cause.

Remember, SFI doesn't really mean anything other than "we guarantee it to meet a certain safety standard against breaking."

This will be my last post in this thread. I'm simply not going to argue with some guy who claims that internet forum members are more knowledgable than Ford's own engineers.

From the horses mouth:

This seems as good a place as any to bring up my observations on this subject, so here goes a very wordy commentary.

Doug, take a look at your crankshaft where the flat surfaces are machined that drive the oil pump. Since the crankshaft should always turn the oil pump (instead of the oil pump turning the crank), there should only be significant marks on two ends of the crankshaft flat surfaces, not on all four. If there are four distinct marks, then I suspect a crankshaft torsional vibration is a possible cause of the oil pump to shatter, as the pump should never turn the crank so you should not see real significant marks on any more than two spots on the crank flats. My wording may be poor, but if you look at the parts and think about it, then it should make sense.

What can cause the torsional vibration (or twisting)? Well, all crankshafts in engines have some amount of this twisting due to the combustion pressure pushing the pistons down and that causes a twisting motion in the crank. Since there are distinct intervals of this going on depending on the number of cylinders, the crankshaft rpm is continuously increasing and decreasing at different rates at different points along the length of the crankshaft itself. This is very minor, so you don't notice it, but the crankshaft feels it and over time it can break or break things that are attached to it. The flywheel and clutch (or torque converter in an automatic) dampens out this twisting at the rear of the crankshaft, but the front is just flopping around, so a torsional vibration damper is installed on the front to control it.

The production crank damper is tuned to reduce this vibration at specific rpms where it is worst and is then deemed appropriate for the production engine. Things that affect the ability of the production crank damper to do its job are:
- changing the crankshaft material (like from a GT cast crank to Cobra forged steel or aftermarket billet),
- changing the stroke (like using a 4.6L crank damper on a 5.4L crank or the opposite),
- running to a higher rpm than production fuel shut-off (since the production crank damper would not have been designed for it and there may be bad vibrations up there that are uncontrolled),
- dramatically increasing the input loads from combustion (each impulse into the crankshaft is much greater, therefore creating more twisting).

In your particular case, you certainly did the last one by using nitrous. But, I'm not aware of people having problems such as yours from nitrous use alone, so this effect may be minor.

However, there are a couple other things that can have a major effect on crank torsional vibrations in general and these are:
- aftermarket superchargers
- aftermarket crankshaft dampers.

You are not using an aftermarket supercharger, but I suspect you are using an aftermarket damper (instead of the "piggyback" style, which can still allow use of the production damper). I really don't know if aftermarket crankshaft dampers are properly tuned, but from what I've seen over the past several years when someone breaks a production oil pump, that does seem to be a common link, so I suspect they may not be tuned for how you are using it.

The other major player is aftermarket superchargers, particularly centrifugal types. I am not aware of any problems related to this with any kit that can be purchased and installed properly, so don't take this as a condemnation of those kits at all. From personal experience, those kits work great. But, when a person gets greedy for more power (face it, we all do, that's why we modify our Mustangs) and doesn't do all of the upgrades properly, problems can result. For example, I broke 3 production oil pumps in my '96 Mustang GT several years ago. The standard Vortech kit was great. Running a smaller pulley for more boost was even better. Swapping to a T-trim was fantastic. But then the oil pumps started shattering. I was lucky enough to see when they would break. It was when I slammed the throttle shut at high rpm at the end of a ¼ mile pass. All 3 broke under the same condition, and with the configuration the car was in at the time, it would only take about 20 passes for it to happen. After lots of looking at the hardware each time and discussions with people having more knowledge, it appeared to be fairly obvious that it was a crankshaft torsional problem. But why was it happening with the T-trim and not the standard S-trim blower? Well, the thought was that the supercharger bypass was not large enough (I was foolishly still using the little plastic bypass from the standard Vortech kit instead of upgrading to the bigger bypass) and the compressor was going into surge. This was being fed back through the supercharger belt and down to the crank, producing rather violent torsional vibes. Unfortunately, as much as I was having fun with breaking parts and learning, I decided to do the PI headswap thing and run naturally aspirated at that point, so I never went back to completely prove/disprove the theory.

But based on personal experience, some logic and seeing what other people have written about their oil pumps breaking, it almost always seems to be caused by one of the reasons listed (aftermarket crank damper, running higher rpm than stock fuel shut-off with the production crank damper, or using a centrifugal supercharger and a bypass that is too small).

The aftermarket billet oil pump gears are stronger than the production pieces, but that is why they don't typically break, not because they address the basic reason for the breakage to begin with. I suspect the production pumps should be okay for anyone who stays with minor mods or even major mods if the above concerns are addressed.

By the way, I suspect (name withheld) pump breakage was likely due to running the engine way above the rpm range the Navigator crank damper was designed for. Or if he was running a 4.6L Cobra damper then it was not tuned for the 5.4L crank torsional characteristics. However, I applaud him greatly for what he's done pioneering the 5.4L 4V performance!

These are just my thoughts, but it may give people some insight as to what is going on (or a good nap if they fell asleep reading it). - EDO

 

[red05bullitgt]

This will be my last post in this thread. I'm simply not going to argue with some guy who claims that internet forum members are more knowledgable than Ford's own engineers.

Well you should've thought about that, before attempting to hijack this thread in the first place.

As it was you, who provoked this so called argument from the very start with your baseless speculations. As a matter of fact, you haven't provided a shred of evidence to prove that Steeda underdrive pulleys, are directly linked to causing oil pump failures in the 2005-08 Mustangs period.

As for what the supposed Ford engineer posted ? I don't recall anything in his post that was directed towards Steeda UDP's as being directly responsible for causing oil pump gears to fail whatsoever.

When in fact, he clearly stated in his post.


From the horses mouth:
Quote:
Originally posted by EDO
This seems as good a place as any to bring up my observations on this subject, so here goes a very wordy commentary.

The production crank damper is tuned to reduce this vibration at specific rpms where it is worst and is then deemed appropriate for the production engine. Things that affect the ability of the production crank damper to do its job are:
- changing the crankshaft material (like from a GT cast crank to Cobra forged steel or aftermarket billet),

However, there are a couple other things that can have a major effect on crank torsional vibrations in general and these are:
- aftermarket superchargers
- aftermarket crankshaft dampers.

You are not using an aftermarket supercharger, but I suspect you are using an aftermarket damper (instead of the "piggyback" style, which can still allow use of the production damper). I really don't know if aftermarket crankshaft dampers are properly tuned, but from what I've seen over the past several years when someone breaks a production oil pump, that does seem to be a common link, so I suspect they may not be tuned for how you are using it.

- EDO


Therefore, If you had bothered to read his post accurately, he was clearly referring to aftermarket crankshaft dampers, that were NOT properly tuned/balanced.


However this is clearly not the case with Steeda pulleys, as I've stated this before, and I'll state it once again.


Steeda underdrive pulleys, are designed and engineered through their exclusive partnership in Ford's technology transfer program to have the proper torsional vibration dampening characteristics for the 4.6L engine.

In other words, this interprets as meaning. That Steeda crankshaft dampers, are indeed properly tuned and balanced for the 4.6L modular engines. In fact the dampers themselves, are the same size as the production damper. Only the crankshaft pulley itself, is smaller.


Otherwise there would be widespread complaints from current 2005-08 GT owners stating they've encountered oil pump related failures, including from your's truly.


However after running the Steeda pulley's for nearly 2 years. I have NOT encountered a single related issue/problem at all.


That being said, before you go and accuse some guy of not having his facts straight. Next time, make damn sure that yours are, before casting the first stone !

 

[Tupperware]

Okay. I'll add a stick to the fire.

Does any of this translate to us "wee" 4.0L guys? UP a potential for problems with us, or not? I don't know if Steeda makes a set for 4.0...but I've seen others.

 

[red05bullitgt]

If it were my car, I wouldn't go with any other underdrive pulley set, but Steeda. I was just on their website, and was unable to locate UDP's for the 4.0L V6.


I would either contact Steeda, or Brenspeed, and find out if they offer Steeda UDP's for your 4.0 V6.


Sorry that I couldn't be more helpful

 

[DarkFireGT]

Out of all the people with the Steeda pullies, I've heard one or 2 complaints of color changing, but no complaints whatsoever with any associated failures.

The Ford technology transfer program works. Period. It allows aftermarket manufacturers to manufacture their parts to OEM spec, and beyond. This is why SHR parts fit like a glove (in most cases, better than stock, due to SHR's insistence on quality) and why the Steeda pullies don't have any related failures.

 

[blacksheep06]

I just ordered steeda pullies friday afternoon from brenspeed and they came in Tuesday.

 

[xxrequiemxx]

I am dropping my car off at the shop to have my rear end done. They are looking to get 200 bucks for the actual steeda pullies which is about average.

I've never dealt with an instlal like this before. Should I have them install or should I attempt myself. On a scale of 1-10, how difficult is the install? I am going to check the writeup board to see if there is one.

Thanks.

 

[DarkFireGT]

I would put the install difficulty at about a 3, and that's only because it requires a pneumatic impact that can go to at least 130lbs. A breaker bar won't do it. But it's actually very simple. It takes less than an hour to install and is very straight forward.

 

[xxrequiemxx]

I just called the company who's doing my gears, and they said 200 for the steeda's and 80 dollars for the install. That makes it 280 + tax.

I mean - it will be the first time I do this. I would have to rent the right tool, and take my time doing the install.

Maybe its worth just paying the 80 bucks to have them install it since its in the shop already?

 

[V8JamesGT]

Yeah $80 isn't bad at all. If I had a shop that would install mine for me for $80 I'd just pay them to do it. But hopefully I'll be installing my Steeda UD Pullies next wednesday or sunday.

Kinda off topic but how much do the stock pullies weigh compared to the steeda pullies?

 

[DarkFireGT]

If you don't have the tools to do it, by all means, pay the $80. Though, that $80 is half way to a Craftsman compressor that can handle the load

 

[NastyStang113]

Screw that, do it yourself, it's so easy.

 

[RKNMACH]

Rocky,
I'm with you on the Steeda products.