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I replaced the old A/C compressor in my SIII with a Sanden many years ago. I made my mounting brackets using flat steel plate cut to the shape needed. I was lucky that I had a spare engine I was working on to sort out the arrangement before I fitted the compressor to the car.
The pulley that was on the new compressor had two belt grooves on it so I removed it and had a machinist remove the extra groove, this made room for the belt adjuster.
I made the two brackets I needed for the compressor and used the original alternator mounting bracket on the engine to mount both it and the new compressor using common mounting bolts. By pure luck the belt alignment was pretty near perfect.
Once I had the new compressor fitted to the car I had a local car aircon workshop fabricate the hoses, replace the receiver/drier and charge the system.
The new compressor is a Sanden SD7H15.
I have attached some pix, the first two are with it on the spare engine and the third is fitted to the car.
The new setup was faultless for several years until I sold the car and way better than the old AC Delco unit.
Cheers,
Jeff.
General arrangement showing the belt adjuster.
Mounting bracketry.
Fitted to the car.
Last edited by watto700; Sep 27, 2025 at 07:56 PM.
Reason: More info
Used the OE steel "thing" with the alternator swung on the underside, and simply made what I wanted. Offcuts of angle iron, shaped to my liking, welded to the platform, and holes drilled, easy as.
Did that for 6 of them, still OK today that I know of. ALL S2 but same, same.
Nothing "off the shelf" then or now.
The compressors I used were all SD508, possibly not current these days, as it was a looong time ago.,
I replaced the old A/C compressor in my SIII with a Sanden many years ago. I made my mounting brackets using flat steel plate cut to the shape needed. I was lucky that I had a spare engine I was working on to sort out the arrangement before I fitted the compressor to the car.
The pulley that was on the new compressor had two belt grooves on it so I removed it and had a machinist remove the extra groove, this made room for the belt adjuster.
I made the two brackets I needed for the compressor and used the original alternator mounting bracket on the engine to mount both it and the new compressor using common mounting bolts. By pure luck the belt alignment was pretty near perfect.
Once I had the new compressor fitted to the car I had a local car aircon workshop fabricate the hoses, replace the receiver/drier and charge the system.
The new compressor is a Sanden SD7H15.
I have attached some pix, the first two are with it on the spare engine and the third is fitted to the car.
The new setup was faultless for several years until I sold the car and way better than the old AC Delco unit.
Cheers,
Jeff.
General arrangement showing the belt adjuster.
Mounting bracketry.
Fitted to the car.
Thanks Jeff for the info. Do you have a picture of how the AC compressor is connected at the bottom bracket?
The only pix I have of what I did are the ones attached above.
If you can download the 2nd pic and blow it up things might be a little clearer. Looking at that pic you will notice four new looking bolts and nuts, the bottom two are a common mounting and pivot point for both the compressor and the alternator with the compressor and alternator mounting either side of the engine mounted bracket. From the left the compressor bracket, alternator, engine bracket. It looks like I had to fabricate the rearward compressor barcket in two pieces and then weld them together to get everything to fit. Sorry I don't have any pix of the brackets.
My car did not have the smog pump so that and the fact that I had another engine in my workshop to trial fit everything made it a whole lot more staright forward than trying to do it all on the car.
