[68gtoMN]

Originally Posted by 'ol Pinion head

Most 9778808 wp pulleys I've pulled originally had a silver cad finish. These were installed on '66 models. The cad plating fades out with time to gray, the finish can even look like a very washed out (faded) black painted pulley. By examining where the fan spacer bolted up, one can see a circle that is still silver cad finish.
The pulley in question... "819" wp pulleys. Every original I've pulled was black painted. Have easily had three-four dozen "819"s, still have several nice used in the pallet section, never had any hint of a gold gad type finish.
In cleaning out dealership stocks, have had a bunch of NOS "819" wp pulleys that were silver cad plated. Have an NOS "819" currently in the pulley stacks which still has a wired on manilla tag from GM Parts Distribution. To install it on anything close to a Concours restored car, I would glass bead & refinish @ 90% gloss black.

Other silver cad factory finish WP pulleys:
In the late 90's hauled in a '63 Tripower GP. It's original wp pulley was silver cad finish. Original timing cover, PS, & pulleys. Have ran across this same part number wp pulley when boneyarding, often pulling it & setting it aside when pulling original water pump cores.

For '67 & '68 models, factory V8 AC cars typ received the "886" WP pulley. Have had several NOS, & ALL were a gloss black. Eventually that gloss black dulls. Have pulled & sold dozens of "886" wp pulleys, as well as matching crank pulleys, all were black, no hint of silver cad underneath the black.

In manual strg stock, have a complete '68 V8 manual steering pulley bracket & pulley set, bought in another dealership parts buyout. Both pulleys look NOS except for slight imprint where the fan spacer was bolted on. At the time of the buyout, I thought the manual strg set interesting. The prev dealership principal then relayed to me, that occasionally, he would get a brand new manual steering late '60's A-body in a dealership trade. On a few occasions, he had one of his mechanics swap on factory PS in order to make a sale. Those '68 manual pulleys are gloss black. Have numerous NOS '70, 70 F-body, & '71 up WP & crank pulleys & all are a gloss black, just like the area under the reinforcement ring on '68+ crank pulleys.

Sooo....I know this guy who has some original pulleys ending in 9786819 (ok, maybe that's the entire part number) where the original finish is visible. Unlike some others who have collected dozens (roger), this other guy only has about 7-8 on hand. Fortunately for us, I know this guy with the 7-8 aforementioned pulleys. I also happen to have been present when "he" looked through one of his boxes again this evening. I also happened to have had my camera handy when "he" was going through his boxes.

I would like to report that of the four of the 9786819 pulleys pulled from this one box, two were distinctly plated (Cad or Zinc - I'm not the plating expert here), another showed some plating through an obvious over-paint and the other was indeterminate, being both very rusty and with clear signs of paint. That makes 75% of the pulleys from this single box as having been plated.


Interestingly, the fully plated pulley appears goldish on the exposed surfaces, but clearly a silver color where not exposed to elements.


The one with an over-paint is soaking in evaporust overnight to see what happens.

Enjoy.