Well the other day I decided that I was going to change my oil the old school way, from underneath my xfr. Yes I know you can suck the oil out from the top of the motor, as I often do but from time to time it's not a bad idea to take things apart underneath the car and have a look around. This time I noticed that my main drive belt have been shredded, so much so that one of the grooves in the belt was completely missing, making the belt 5 instead of a 6 Groove belt. When I started to take things apart to replace the belt, I noticed the uppermost pulley retaining bolt had backed out, and that another idler pulley was actually bent. How all this happened I don't know?
That's when I decided it might be a good idea to replace all of the pulley bearings. While it's not a hard job, it does require access to a press or vice.
What I used

Nothing like an industrial press to make easy work of pressing in and out bearings.

The 2 deep sockets I used for pressing, when pressing in or out a pulley bearing you want to use the largest socket that will fit over the bearing, ESPECIALLY WHEN PRESSING IN THE BEARINGS, AS YOU ONLY WANT TO PRESS AGAINST THE BEARINGS RACE!

The old bearings will be destroyed. There are 6 pulleys in the XFR belt drive system, 5 are metal and 1 is plastic, only the metal pulleys have replacable bearings.

Of the 5 pulleys 4 take the same part number, this set of bearings cost me $41, Jaguar wanted $121 for the bent pulley that I found. I found that pulley on eBay for $40. I used an upgraded steel covered bearings versus the original equipment rubber covered bearings.

As I said you want to use the largest socket that will fit on top of the bearing, I'm pressing this new bearing in. That's why the pulley is not sitting over and opening, if I were pressing the bearing out, the pulley would be sitting over and opening.

Bearings replaced it's time to put all the pulleys on the car. The non-serviceable plastic pulley is on the tensioner farthest to the left, it tensions the main drive belt. Mine was fine, only the bearing in the pulley on the engine side of that mounting assembly was suspect. Notice the new bearings are fully metal encased.

Hopefully this keeps any bolts from backing out again.

Dayco exact fit belts. I DIDN'T TAKE A PICTURE OF IT BUT WHEN YOU DISASSEMBLE THE MAIN BELT DRIVE, TO GET THE BELT OFF YOU'LL HAVE TO REMOVE THE IDLER ASSEMBLY FROM THE ENGINE, THE NEW BELT NEEDS TO BE LOOPED THROUGH THAT ASSEMBLY BEFORE YOU RE ATTACH THAT ASSEMBLY TO THE ENGINE, it also has to be looped around its tensioner before that tensiner is installed too. Just look at the belt routing diagram and you'll see what I mean.

Gates belts, the Fleetrunner is a lifetime belt it's also about 10mm shorter but will fit. The key is to work the slack up to your highest pulley' the water pump on the main drive and then fully depress the tensioner to slip it on. The best way to get th belt on the supercharger drive is to work the slack over to the SC belt tensioner, fully depress that tensioner and slip the belt over that slick pulley.

If your tensioners have any metal bulges around the 3/8 hole that might keep your tensioner tool from full engagement polish or file them off.

3 of the pulleys have a plastic isolator, you want this flush with the bearing when you re install the pulley.

The plastic non servicable pulley. Before buying from Jag if yours is bad try googling the part number.
Go slow, as usual I've left out somthings like wrench sizes and the drive belt diagram as that's my disclaimer, you pull all the tools and info, you're responsible for the outcome.

All back together.

 

Great write-up as always, Sir!

 

Nice job! I couldnt have done it better myself