Sagres74

Going to work last week, my alternator belt went to shreds. The alternator and ABS dash lights promptly came on but, for the short commute, I was able to finish my drive to and from work. The car has been parked since as I took a family trip to MA. Now that I am back and have done some research, here are some questions:

- Is the new and improved alternator pulley worth the $113? Pros/cons?
- Parts catalog calls for a 9.5x760 belt or 9.5x753/757/776 belt? Any idea what the difference is (aside the latter from being longer)?
- My car had a 10X760 belt: Any idea if the wider belt is better?

So far, I have the following on my to-purchase list (~$275):
- Snap-on 12 point bit makes more sense than the Porsche special tool.
- Belt tensioner (993-106-035-00)
- alternator belt X 2 (999-192-343-50)
- A/C belt (999-192-363-50)
- Alternator Pulley (updated version) (993-106-268-01)

Any thoughts/words of wisdom are greatly appreciated!

zenithblue993

Alternator pulley - updated one. 74$

http://www.ebay.com/itm/350646786297

Garth S

Replace the fan belt as well - it is likely the same age as the alt belt.

Consider buying the RS hub and a new fan belt, and deleting the alt belt, pulley, and "tensioner" ...... ~ $90+$25 for the belt. This single belt system has been in my car for 5+ years, and works great. Another plus is that the hub has studs, so the outer puller is retained by three 10mm lock nuts - far easier to service than the Allan head bolts.

EMBPilot

Buy spacers (alternator and Fan, different sizes and quantities) as you will likely need to add some and adjust tension. purchase a NAPA kricket belt tensioner (low scale one, i think is KR1 or KR2?), to cross check belt tension with your thumb as a back up.

if the belts are on too tight you'll be in for it 6-12 months down the road, dont ask me how i know...

replace the bolts that hold the pulley halves.
replace the belt sensor its cheap.

consider going to RS single pulley, if i had to do this all over again (and i got to do it three times!) i would have gone RS style.

do a RL search, as well as one under my user name you'll find more details and info.

Quadcammer

RS is for chumps who don't drive at night or use their electrical facilities.

The standard set up is fine. Get the updated pullies and porsche belts. Feel the belt sensor bearing for grittiness. If it turns fine, maybe add a touch of lubricant and leave it there.

Dudley

+1

BobbyT

Correct belts are: (inner-cooling fan) Porsche 999 192 338 50, (outer-alternator) Porsche 999 192 343 50, (AC) Porsche 999 192 363 50. I recommend only genuine Porsche belts--there have been some reports of strange problems, including false knock sensor signals, traced back to use of non-Porsche belts. One of our local PCA members worked in the V-belt industry, and said this might be due to slight differences in the flexing of the belts...

The pulley update is a good one, especially if you've seen pictures of the engine lid damage when an original one failed.

JasonAndreas

You could always bump your idle speed to 1100RPM like the factory.

Quadcammer

You could, but a 3.6l six cylinder idling at 1100rpm seems a bit ridiculous to me.

hkspwrsche

So all the different sizes mentioned above are not relevent to the factory belt sizing it seems? Porsche only has one size belt for each one? Curious as I was about to order some belts as well and was just about to search for this info.

Stealth 993

I say get the RS kit. It is after all all PORSCHE parts.

Fact is the RS pulley is simpler then the duel design, it's far easier to replace the belt, and you never have to worry about the pulley bearing failing shredding both belts. Plus the car feels faster and rev better, almost like a light weight flywheel.

So tired of the naysayers saying you car will not charge with it, or leave you stranded. Not sure about how others drive but I don't spend 2+ hours at a time idling. Porsche made the part for a production car. If it was unsafe chances are they would not have used it. I daily drove my 993 for 5 years (in BAD traffic) with the RS pulley, never had any battery, alt or cooling problems.

Quadcammer

yawn. yes its simpler, but so what? A 350 small block is simpler than a porsche 3.6, but theres a reason there isn't one in the back of your car, right?

point is, the stock set up works perfectly fine. If you do belts every 30k miles, you really should have no issue whatsoever. The stock set up is not hard to work with, provides both adequate cooling and charging under all circumstances (like sitting in 3 hours of traffic, at night, in the rain, etc), and hasn't shown any statistically significant problems with reliability.

It feels faster and revs better? Give me a freaking break. If the car gained 5bhp out of this mod, i'd be shocked, and if you're now telling me you can tell the difference out of 5 bhp, I'm calling bs to the max.

Aside from a heavily tracked car, there is really no point to the RS set up.

Stealth 993

We can agree to disagree. You can feel the difference. I have not had any downsides on either of my cars with it. In 6 years of 993 ownership, no batteries have been replaced.

I argue there is no reason not to get a single bet setup. On that rainy night what would rather change, 45min for the normal duel belt or 15min with the single belt? Plus I only have to carry one spare belt with me.

Totally agree on changing the belts every 30k with Porsche OEM belts.

Dudley

If you have not tried the RS pulley, I say go for it. But keep your original parts.
If nothing else, it will be a good test of your charging system.

I came to my opinion after only one incident. I performed the mod, the car left me stranded on the back roads of Pennsylvania, and I sold the mod. I'll bet many of the nay-sayers are basing their opinion on similarly small samples.

NP993

I've had the RS pulley on my car for five years and never had a problem, and I drive at night with AC on all the time, and sit in traffic quite a bit too. Also don't think you need factory tensioner gauge -- pretty easy to get the tension dead-on without it. My v-belt is past the 50K mark and looks great. V-belt breakage is almost always caused by operator error -- installing it too tightly. All it has to do is spin the fan and alternator without slippage through the RPM range, no tighter.

Benefit of RS setup: fewer parts = less potential for problems.