I have lowered the boom on vendors in the past, but this one takes the cake.

With the re-build of my R3/W8 engine I changed over to a Jesel belt drive. When I was installing it, I found out that the balancer would not tighten up against the lower pulley. After comparing parts, the throat of the pulley was significantly shorter than the gear I pulled off. Called Jesel and talked to their "belt drive engineer". He looked thru his stash of information and found an early revision of the lower pulley drawing that removed almost exactly the amount I was lacking to be able to tighten the balancer up. They seen what happened and promptly made me a spacer to go between the lower pulley and the nose of my balancer hub. I explained to them that the early high end (read Pro Stock Truck) Bryant cranks that the system was initially designed for had a shorter register and is likely why the pulley was shortened. I suggested adding the spacer to the kit and some instructions on when it is needed. Now, on to the upper pulley/cam adapter. When degreeing the camshaft, I kept coming up with 183 degrees (shooting for 104). I ended up having to move the upper pulley 6 teeth and had to use up 5 degrees of the adjustment to get it dialed in. Come to find out, the cam key location was also different on the early pro stock truck stuff. This should make it easy to re-assemble when the time comes. Don't know why anyone would be disgusted after spending $1500 for "premium" parts right?

Now, I'm changing over to a Jesel belt driven distributor. This should be easy right...

Well, I guess they expected everyone to suspend their engines using sky hooks or the factory motor mounts (because most people that would use a belt drive and front mounted distributor would also use the stock mounts and not an engine plate). Their distributor bracket is designed to mount right to the front of their cam belt drive cover using the upper two holes (where the water pump would mount). Since their cam drive cover doesn't cover the water inlet holes and the distributor bracket doesn't cover them.....how is anyone supposed to make this work? I would expect most users of this system to be using some type of engine mounting plate of 1/4" or 3/8" and that would fit in front of the Jesel cam drive cover and space the distributor bracket to far forward by the same amount. The distributor bracket has lugs on it that can be machined down to work with most applications. I suggested this as a fix as it would make the bracket much cheaper to manufacture since they would be starting with a 1/2" thick aluminum chunk rather than a 1" thick piece (which mostly gets machined away). Then they could package the spacers to get what ever combo is desired to align the belt.

I have been doing design and engineering work for 24 years and making products more manufactureable (lean manufacturing) is one of my strengths. I offered this "constructive" advice free of charge to Jesel and also offer it as another reason they don't sell more of these kits (and Mopar guys are cheap for the most part). For $2K I expect this stuff to work out of the box. When I asked about having the bracket modified so it would actually fit.....they said it was a custom part and they would have to charge me an additional $225. This modification should take about 15 minutes to perform on their existing bracket?

So, I uess they are not offering to actually "fix" any of the issues with their SB mopar kits. I can only say, spend your money accordingly folks. I guess I will just modify the bracket myself since I have access to a mill, but then again doesn't everyone?

I know it is a long winded rant, but what do you guys think? I have several hours invested in figuring out what the issues are and describing not only the problems, but also offering "fixes". I never asked to be paid for my time..... Makes me want to tool up and produce my own just for spite.

Tool up.
Companies like that should honor guys like you that re-think the box and some times out of it.

I make a lot of parts that are designed to fill in the blanks between what the big guys do. It is just the nature of the business. There are so many variations of parts floating around that it becomes super difficult for mfgs to get everything to work.

Lots of companies have been started and became successful - simply because somebody was unhappy with their purchase or lack of choices. When they would make something for themselves or fix somebody else's mistakes - other people would ask for the same thing and the new venture would be born.

That was how my business started. I found so many problems with Mopar Performance parts that I started to build my own stuff. Then it just took off from there.

As for Jesel, they make killer products but they do not worry too much about the lower end bracket type engines. They assume that their customers are pro engine builders with fab capability. That is why I make things such as TDC pointers for Jesel belt drives as well as motor plate brackets for Jesel belt drive distributors. I also make spacers and brackets to run the belt drive stuff with electric water pumps and other such parts. Jesel just doesn't spend time trying to design all of those related parts. They are good guys to work with, but they don't try to do everything for everybody.

I bought a tach from Brian Smith, it was shipped promptly, packaged well and works great

It sounds like there is some markup on these parts there to compete, I say go for it

I had one cam from MP that was 26* off... the key way
was ground off... I set that at the so called dot to
dot to get a base then degree it... but the valves
crashed on the first turn.... I changed to setting
the crank at the 108* and set the intake lobe at top
then checked all the lobes once I had it at the proper
108... then I advanced it 4*.... that box the cam
came in was already open so I think someone bought
it and gave it back... other than the key way being
off the cam was fine... it was a roller cam

Jesel products are half-*ssed at best! The fit for most of their belt drives is questionable at best and usually requires some sort of machining to make them usuable. They make some decent parts but as a complete system/package they aren't very good. I am very fortunate that my machinist/engine builder was able to build my belt drive for my R3 W9 engine. It works perfectly! I bought the cam gear and hub it attaches to used off E-bay for $75, it was off a sbc, and he made a new hub, bottom gear, and the cam retainer plate incorporating the bearings and seals needed for it. I don't remember how much it cost altogether but for what Jesel charges I'm sure I could have built at least three of them! There is a group buy here on Moparts, I wish all the guys that go in on it good luck...

lets see here.. one after market part.. and another after market part.. then some after market nuts and bolts.. then try to bolt it to the other after market part what could go wrong.. I feel your pain going through the same stuff here but different parts

I never wish things like Brian is talkin about on people.I do however read these post carefully and have learned a ton.Brian i feel for ya,on the other hand ur very talented and see+ are able to correct these problems.I personally would be screwed and would have to pay for the fix alot more.So in a nut shell thanks for the education,also to AndyF for the odd and end fixes(more sb please Andy) thanks for the info.

[/quote did you mean half a$$ed like your quarter panels looks like you half a$$ them with a torch and you never gave me a price on your super man port work for my w8s

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guys like you are not worthy... Best of luck with you 10 second junk.

If it comes out of a box it needs to be modified to fit. Remember that and you won't be disapointed. There are vendors here and out there that do make/sell qualitiy stuff. John Cope and Bob George come to mind. Dave

My big block Jesel belt drive also required moving 3 teeth. I won't even go into my Friends 6.1 hemi rocker arm debacle.
Doug

Stuff like this is also why good assembled race motors cost so much. A lot of time making things work.

To use my ATI balancer on my hemi with the Jesel drive, I had to make a crank spacer to keep the balancer from hitting the front cover. But, the belt drive works great. Dyno

WHY DIDNT YOU JUST USE A WRBER

bottom line you don't get what you pay for anymore and thats about everything. quality and customer service has taken a turn for the worse in most cases.

I can completely understand where you are coming from Brian, biggest problem is they wouldn't sell enough of them to give two craps about changing or fixing them. I am sure the Small Block Chevy units are perfect