I'll keep this fairly short and sweet....

For less than $140 (installing them yourself of course) and a few hours free time to screw off, and have fun installing them, I'm going to have to say do it. New belts and all (although I don't know why they included a shorter than OE alternator belt!?) Anyone on this.... I ended up re-using the OE belt.

All seems good. Throttle response is better in my mind, and slightly via the sometimes not reliable "butt dyno." None the less, it is a big improvement with the A/C on! This is where it really shines. I made several nice runs in second gear (with redline shifting of course) yesterday with the front defog on (compressor a crank'n,) and she pulled hard. That part the butt dyno had no trouble feeling.

All's good with voltage too. I'm using Cyberdyne's plug and play (in your acc. outlet) digital voltmeter. All day running around with lights on, defog, rear defog, radio, seat heater, etc. she held to no lower than 12vdc at idle. Most of the time without the seat heater, or rear defogger on, it stayed in the 14vdc+ range (idle.) Always right around 14.2vdc at speed. This is a big plus for a daily driver. We sure as hell don't need any alternator / battery trouble on a perfectly good new car!!!

All, in all, I'm very happy with them. And last but not least, they look cool as a hell. I don't know maybe it just me..... but it sure seems the pulleys, headers, cai, and hopefully RES + MM2, all blend together nicely under the hood.

Enjoy all - Jim

PS - If you decide to get these, buy'm from Tim www.autocarparts.com

As I've yet to have any trouble with this fine company (and that's a refreshing change in todays bullsh!t web site commerce.)

 

How tough was the installation? any special tool is needed?

 

Well just a word of warning... when you are at idle with all those accesories turned on, your battery is actually draining. You can verify this at any AutoZone parts store that has an alternator/battery tester. As long as your RPM's are over 1,000 you produce the same amount of current as you did with the stock pulleys.

Typically at idle, your voltage should never drop below 13.8 volts even with all the accessories turned on. If you are below 12.5 volts at idle then you are putting a serious hurting on your battery. Just be careful if you have to drive in a lot of rush hour traffic, or stop n go type stuff. If you mainly do highway driving you won't have any probs.

 

I guess I'll answer this one here. For Nashua -

Install needs to be done where you've got plenty of room (oh, shall we say, a dealership garage on a closed Sat. morning!)

Not hard, but time consuming. You can break the alternator pulley nut before loosening the belt. It helps to have a Helm's manual handy (of which I own.) You do not need to remove the OE PS belt. It's actually longer than the one supplied by AEM. I have no idea why this is, but using the OE belt will save you the time of messing with the passenger side motor mount. Figures, I never get the inside scoop before I do the work.

The alternator pulley is a different beast. You really need to unbolt it completely from the block, and face the pulley upward to use a 1/2" air gun with a 22mm impact socket. It comes right off. Any other way is not gonna work, trust me on this! Let's just say I had to install the AEM unit after trying to get the son of a bitch OE pulley off before realizing what the heck to do.

Last but not least, to release the tension on the main belt tensioner, you'll need a nice Snap-on (or equiv.) long 14mm box wrench. this is a must. I found it easier to do the main belt install / belt tension device manipulation with help of another person. One holds the wrench, while the other gets the damn belt around the bottom of the crank pulley.

And one last thing, you need the passenger front wheel off to get to the crank pulley area.

HTH - Jim

 

Bnut -

Trust me you are correct! For most of my idle situations yesterday, I was in the 14vdc range. I don't anticipate the worst case scenario (that was with the high beams on as well BTW,) to happen all too often.

Still a valid point. I'm keeping my eye on the voltage gauge for awhile. Time will tell more on this.....

 

Thanks for the info

 

Glad to help.

 

ditto to everything makd says ...

i took the alternator out, then used an impact wrench (1000 pounds of torque) to zip the bolt off ... since there were no holes in the pulley to put a screwdriver thru to hold it. it takes time and is not easy, and yes, the one belt is useless. i actually loosened the motor mount on the passenger side, and took out the power steering fluid reservoir to get enough room. it looks cool ... hopefully makes a difference at the track ... that's why I did it.

 

For all those still reading this, my earlier post should have said "the AEM PS belt supplied is actually shorter than the OE belt."

Makes more sense now don't it!

 

I thought I'd add in a bit to this:

http://www.acura-cl.com/forums/showt...5&pagenumber=2

With now 8K additional on the car everything is still going well.

Notice the date?? A while ago....

 

should i not bother installing the pulley on the alternator?

i'd rather just have the top one for looks really, and i still have pice of mind.

what do you think?

 

Scalbert - good observation (and post from way back!) Thanks for linking that in this thread. Most folks don't realize the power of air / impact tools. Sometimes you've got to use them, no matter what others think, or say!

TypeSDragoon - Do them both. You can alway install the PS pulley now, and do the alternator later (when time and resources become available!!) It really takes both pulleys to get the full benefit (looks and HP to the wheels gain!!)

 

You get up pretty early mackdaddy. I still haven't gone to sleep yet. It's 3:59. I work swing shift though.

 

Only though necessity (damn work!!)

Plus it stopped raining (yeah!!) Now I can go listen to the intoxicating CAI/VTEC wail on the way to work.......

 

now 4 and i still havent gone to sleep. hehe. im wide awake. but i'll be one tired mofo tommorow.

 

Will you guys go get some sleep!!!!

Damn internet, depriving folks of much needed rest all over the world.

 

 

I also just now realized that my original post should have made reference to the PS belt as well, not the alternator belt.

The alternator belt supplied by AEM is the one I used..... and used the OE PS belt.

Need to start double checking myself a bit more!

 

I have no problems with it....those that seemed to have problems were people running at idle for long periods of time with lots of power running through their systems....the alternator on the Type-S is 120amps....far more than the regular CL...which is 105amps...and the Accord v6....probably 105 amps.....at best, more likely less.

 

so do you have a system in your car? I have about 800w going through my system and my inside lights dim pretty bad...it makes me a little nervous since I have the pulleys.

 

I have a 360 PUNCH....powering my subs...no problem...I haven't seen any kind of dimming....if that dimming occurs...I would suggest a 1 farad Cap...
Or a gel battery...(Optima) would help.

 

See I have asked a few audio people and they make it seem like a 1 F cap will not help...but that it would hurt(since I have pulleys) because the alt. and the battery have to work harder to charge up the cap...putting a bigger strain on the alt and the battery...is this right? It might help with the dimming but will hurt the rest cuz of the pulleys.

As far as the gel battery...I have seen to much on them...what is the deal with them? hold more juce or something...that stops the dimming of the lights...cuz mine dime pretty good when I am jaming and idel.

 

The pulley is fine over a thousand rpms...so once you start moving..it'll start charging your cap....