Shown here are the remnants of the old air pump pulley assembly after the rubber coupler came apart. My first attempt at fixing the coupler was an emergency situation, as I was just about to leave on a 1,100 mile drive with my cats from Dallas to Las Vegas. I made a coupler out of a round piece of pine I had lying around. Shown in the picture is the remnant of that coupler, which amazingly survived the 1100 mile drive at 3800rpm and broke right after I got to Las Vegas. The pink thing is a hockey puck I bought at K-mart for $6. It's made of hard plastic, was the perfect size, and was cheap. A perfect combination! Note the workbench, which consisted of a used pizza box on the kitchen counter.

The hockey puck had many little bumps on it which had to be cut off to make a flat surface. A wood chisel was the perfect tool for this - a few taps with the hammer and the chisel sliced them right off. The little black bumps flew all over my apartment, but that's the price you pay.

I had to cut holes in the puck for the three bolts that hold the fan on, which go through the pulley assembly. The holes had to be big enough to allow a socket to get around the head of the bolt. Cutting through the puck revealed that it was not uniform all the way through. The black surface was very hard but the pink plastic underneath was more soft and spongy. I was disappointed at this, but hoped that it would still work okay.

The puck after all three holes were drilled. Note how nicely the pizza box contains all the plastic shavings.

The back flange is now mounted to the puck. Clearance check for the socket...

Notice that the pulley assembly actually has two bearings on the pulley end. This makes it very sensitive to alignment where it bolts to the hub. The old rubber coupler provided some flexibility - the hockey puck will provide almost none. If it's not perfectly straight, there will be vibrations possibly leading to bearing failure. The bearings have been cleaned and greased with Valvoline synthetic grease in preparation for the install.

The pulley assembly completely assembled and ready to install. All plastic shavings, dirty paper towels, etc are wrapped up in the pizza box along with some old crusts ready to be walked out to the dumpster and the kitchen counter is none the worse for wear. If like me you are without a garage to work in, the pizza box makes a great temporary workbench, and most bachelors have a few of them lying around. I should send this idea in to "Hints by Helouise" or whatever her name is. I wonder if she has a bachelors edition?

The pully assembly installed on the engine. Everything looked good but there were some vibrations when I started up the engine. I don't know what to do about it so I will just drive it for a while and see if it comes apart. If it does, I'll buy another hockey puck and try again!

Ahhhh... it's nice getting tangible results from your work. The bus will once again be tolerable in the desert heat, at least for a while. The vent is aimed at the thermometer on the left to give a rough estimate of the A/C outlet temperature. It will go down to the low 40s but never into the 30s. My friends who are still running R12 tell me I will never see 30s with 134a but that's okay, 40's are good enough for me.