NEED TO VENT/RANT

[95Mustang302]

OK, so lets start this tale from the beginning.

I am eliminating my a/c compressor, and my smog pump, and using a 93 cobra water pump pulley and finding a belt has been a nightmare, this may be even harder than when I do the tko swap.

So I measure and I knew I'd ahve to go back a few times to get it right but I wanted a rough estimate of what I had to get. I came up with 77 inches. Went to the local autozone and told the MORON behind the counter that I needed a 6 Rib 77" belt... First question out of his mouth is what car is it for? I had to explain to him that its not for a certain car its for a custom belt routing... So he tells me that they don't have a belt that size. So as pissed as I am already because the guy didn't even look I went home and found the part number for that belt online and went back. Same guy helped me and said OH THAT ONE!. I thought to myself yeah ****ing right. SO I buy it, well its to short, I go back and tell them that I need a 79 and we'll try that. We dont' ahve a 79, FINE, got the part number went back, OH THAT ONE!!!, we don't ahve any... Next size we have is an 87 and I was so irritated that he would even tell me that they had that size when its 10" too big. So I left and went to another store. WEll they had the 79, so I bought it but it was too long, the tensioner was bottoming out. So I went to carquest and got a 78 and they charged me $50 for the belt, i had to choke it down and take it. I got it home and its just a WEEE bit to short. So I took it back and the 79, and decided to try the 77.5, well that size still didn't fit. So now I ahve to wait till monday to go SOMEWHERE, and get a 78.5" belt. Hopefully it will not cost me 50 dollars.

Cliff notes for the lazy folk...
-Idiots work at parts stores
-trying to size serpentine belt
-cant find right size without offering up my first born son
-extremely pissed off...

 

[trav_19]

yeah the reasons i dont deal with auto zone complete idiots.... if someone applys then your qualified to sell parts lol thats why i liked where i worked it was harder then **** to get in but everyone there knew what the hell was going on lol

 

[1TallMF]

I had a similar issue, but the guy at the counter was only half an idiot, not a complete one. I swapped to a smaller alternator pulley to fix my idle charging issue but for the life of me could not find a belt that would fit. They don't have enough sizes available. I ended-up giving up at the end and put the stock pulley back on.

 

[The Green GT]

Yea and we have 4 O2 sensors too. lol

 

[Wi Stang]

Yeah, I am going to be doing the same thing this spring, and I am not looking forward to trying to find the correct belt.

By the way, what techinque did you use to measure and come up with the initial measurement of 77"?

 

[MustangGT95]

I worked at Advance Auto for 4 years. I was the only person that there that understood that modded cars take different parts.

The belt part numbers are so simple. Driveright brand goes by the inch then then a K then the ribs. So 77'' 6 rib is a 770k6. 77.5 would be a 775k6. So simple.

Then daycos would be 9060770 for a 77'' 6 rib and 9060775 for a 77.5''. Why these dumbass' can't figure it out I have no idea.

 

[HISSIN50]

Sometimes you have to play dumb so you don't offend the counterguy. I'll say something like 'I think you can infer the length from the part number. Can we ask one of the older guys here if they are familiar with the belt nomenclature?' Then you find someone like GT95 and he helps ya.

This gives the guy an out as not feeling dumb (even though you know the answer - you don't really wanna piss the guy off or belittle him). Then he's eager to learn about this old timer/insider secret and you get the right part.

 

[Bosko5.0]

my belt cost me $60 cause its a rare size.

to help them I look up the part first online get the part# write it down and give it to them. they tell me what it is and I tell them and I tell sure why not????

luckly for me there is a guy that has a nice 96 gt and he knows there are different parts thatll work.

 

[trav_19]

the easiest way to measure is to wrap a string around all of your remaining pulleys and make a mark then take the string out of the engine compartment and measure it....

hissin i agree you dont want to make them feel stupid but a lot of guys now dont care about customer service and dont want to have to learn more then absolute minimum to get there checks.

i worked at auto value and a lot of you might not be familiar but auto value bought out all the performances so maybe some of you know that store... i hated it when we didn't have a part and i would call around to find it for a customer and i sometimes called auto zone of no one else had it to see if he could check a part number for me and they would say whats it for and i would tell them i have the part number and he would say he cant look it up that way.....worst case senario get in the books noob lol but i would always look up the numbers in the brands they carried to make them not have to think too hard i didn't want to give anyone a seizure down there. lol
i remember so many times having to go down there after hours to get a part or soething i needed and i would tell them i had a gt and they would ask if it was a v6 or a v8 .....just goes to show you, you dont need to know anything about parts to get hired at auto zone lol

 

[1TallMF]

I don't think I've ever gone to any parts store yet that hasn't asked me if it was V6 or V8 when I told them its a GT. Even when buying a tail light bulb

 

[trav_19]

I don't think I've ever gone to any parts store yet that hasn't asked me if it was V6 or V8 when I told them its a GT. Even when buying a tail light bulb

well i can tell you that at our stores it does the complete list and ask engine size and everything then if you need to search a catagory that needs the info its already in the comp....we were just smart enough not to ask engine size if someone needed bulbs lol