Cleaning up the accessory drive
 

It looks like crap. I priced out replacing everything on Rockauto and that added up fast. The whole idea is to try to do this on a budget.

I'm currently thinking of leaving the water pump on and painting it with the engine. Stripping the accessory bracket down and maybe having it powder coated? Alternator has me stumped. Tensioner and idler could probably just be replaced.

Any good ideas or best practices here? Or pictures?

Re: Cleaning up the accessory drive
 

spray electrical cleaner and a wire brush may clean that alternator up....if you don't feel up to it you might take it to a alternator shop and have them clean it for you....
a lot of that other could be cleaned up in a blast cabinet easily

Re: Cleaning up the accessory drive
 

You can split the case halves on the alternator and drop the guts out if you have some fortitude and a manual. IMO its a pain and rarely worth it, but I know lowrider guys do it all the time to have that stuff gold/chrome plated.

Re: Cleaning up the accessory drive
 

Just an FYI, but the newer alternators arent as easy to take apart as the older ones. You have to unsolder some of the connections to get it apart.

Re: Cleaning up the accessory drive
 

Here's my 5.3 accessory drive.

https://talk.classicparts.com/media/...-bay.6762/full

I ran the brackets through the glass bead cabinet and sprayed them with a little rattle-can clear

It seemed like a good idea to replace the waterpump on this junkyard motor so that's new. Ditto for the idlers.

The alternator I bought at the junkyard, and the plan is to do what Br3w suggests. I'll take it to a local starter/alternator shop and have them split the case, take it home and glass bead the housings, push the bearings out and replace them and then reassemble.

The power steering pulley sits low on a truck, so I probably won't do anything with that, but if you wanted to you could buy a nice aluminum one from Howe or a bunch of other sources. I took the reservoir off of the pump and will have an aluminum ebay remote reservoir (needed this anyway for the Hydroboost)