<VV> Belt issues

[Smitty]

Didn't the original belt system exhibit these problems during testing? Was
there no cold weather testing and so on?
Regards,
Bob
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Smitty Says;  Bob I know others will remember this.  We had a guest speaker
engineer at one of the conventions that had been asked about the belt
problem.  He said yes we knew we had a problem.  We were locked in on engine
design and could not change that.  All we could do was try to make the belt
survive.  The belt company engineers provided several different designs
which all failed under extreme conditions.  They finally came up with a
killer belt that did not fail in all their testing.  They put it on the
engine with all us Chevy engineers standing around.  They revved the engine
hard and put it through all kinds of acceleration and deceleration.  Then
they stepped back and smiled............. Till one of the Coevair engineers
reached over and grabbed the throttle and immediately flipped the belt off.
They knew just exactly what to do to make it happen.
I can tell you from experience that if you autocross on a fast track and
down shift and dump the clutch on it, you are likely to lose the belt.
Spike has been run on a dozen road courses and still has the same belt after
8-9 years, but I heel and toe the downshifts.  My other cars use the same
no=name belts that last for years, but I guarantee you on my wagon (110
engine, 60 fan, PG) I can snap one in half without moving the car.  That has
to be brutally hard on the damper and bearings so I don't do that to prove I
can, even on a bet.
So the answer is, again.  Yes they knew they had a problem.  They answered
it with the best belt they could provide, but even that wasn't idiot proof.
If anybodys Corvair throws belts while being normally driven, there is a
problem with pullys or component alignment.  The engineering was done and it
works for the guy they designed it for.