goatwgn

I have a '74 Olds Cutlass that still has the factory AC box and condenser on it. Car has over 500000 miles on it. Freshened up the engine due to weak compression at 493000. the car has aTH350, and a 3.08 rear axle. I replaced the 2nd A6 compressor on it a few years back with a generic brand Pro6ten style compressor. I also have a VIR eliminator kit, with R134a. It blows pretty cold, about 38 degrees out of the vents, on a 90 degree day. Recently, I made a couple of long trips, and it seems like anything over about 65 mph, I pick up noise and vibration from the AC compressor. I didn't seem to notice this until I installed the VIR eliminator on there last year, which helped the AC performance immensely, but it does cycle the compressor. The belt also jumps a bit, (no matter how tight you get it). (It has always seemed to do this) and even does that on another car I have with an Olds V8. I should have bit the bullet and bought the actual Pro6ten compressor, and I may not have this issue, although the A6 even seemed a little noisy at higher rpm. I am now thinking of installing a new Sanden compressor I have as a spare I picked up for my '66 Pontiac Tempest wagon with an aftermarket AC. I think it will have less drag on the engine, although I am unsure how well it will work with the rest of the AC system. I am curious if any of you have installed one on a factory system, and how well it worked. Also curious how it looks on an Olds V8. I know it should give me a lot more room at the rh front of the engine. Thanks

goatwgn

This is the Sanden 508 on my Pontiac, but this is part of an add on under dash AC I got from Classic Auto Air in 2007

goatwgn

Engine in the Olds. I use this car a lot. I was concerned about original appearance, but I think being an efficient AC system with lower drag (especially with todays gas prices, would beat out original appearance. Thinking of an overdrive as well.

oddball

The guts of a Pro6Ten *are* a Sanden. Don't recall if it's a 508 or a 706... or... I'm drawing blanks on the Sanden series designations. Anyway, don't recall if it's the 5 or 7 piston design, but it's Sanden guts. They just make custom end caps to use the A6 mounts and fittings. So won't see much inherent difference. Of course, the no-name pro6 certainly uses a knock-off Sanden, so it could have quality issues.

Mounting it is the hard part. There's not a whole lot of bracket options for the Olds. The Dirty Dingo guys make adapters that convert a Sanden to a R4 for mounting, so if you can find R4 brackets.....

Also, you can use this excuse to do the serpentine swap using the Chevy v6 brackets! That gets the compressor up and forward. I can actually remove the valve cover (including its 3/8" spacer and studs in the head) without moving the compressor.

goatwgn

Haven't heard of using the 4.3 Chevy serpentine drive. I'll need to check into this.

oddball

Here's the setup I used.
https://classicoldsmobile.com/forums...kit-bbo-97397/
He makes a SBO set also (which was on my 403 and now on my diesel block). Larry is a stand up guy and helped me out with the setup. There *are* variances in the bolt pattern on the head, so someone that stays in touch with you is important.
The only notable thing for me is I had a machinist drill the chevy pattern in the ford pulley (I use ATI balancers) and made a little bushing to take up the slack between the ford snout size and the olds snout size. Not necessary, but a nice little touch. I did make a little reinforcement bar to go from the back of the tensioner (there's a bolt hole there) to the front bolt of the intake. That whole assembly is only held on with two bolts to the adapter plate, so it can flex and throw the belt.
There are different versions of the driver side bracket. Some have two bolts on the bottom, some just one. Both fit the same. I forget the details, but there is another bracket setup that looks very similar in the junkyard, but does not fit. Maybe it was on LS-based v6's? It was three or four years ago that I dug this stuff out of a local yard, so I forget. e.g., my set came off a '94 C1500 v6. I think it was the setup starting in 97 or 98 looks similar but is different.

For awareness, also check out this thread:
https://classicoldsmobile.com/forums...-300-a-147043/
Life gets complicated, doesn't it?
I will say Terrence's guide is really well written:
https://pacificgbody.com/blogs/shop/...ine-conversion

olds 307 and 403

Impressive mileage out of that 350, the most reliable motors for their time. Best I did on a 307 was 475,000 km. There should be Sanden brackets for Olds available but maybe not separate from the kits. also have used Larry's serpentine adapter brackets and have a Flowkooler water reverse rotation water pump. I used a redrilled 351W bottom pulley. The rest was off a 94 Z71 with a sbc 350. The fuel line to carb, needs custom bends to work.