Tensioner Pulley

So I went wheeling in the Pine Barrens and attempted to use my Tacoma as a submarine. In the process I took out my starter (which I was able to open up and clean the solenoid, fixing my problem) and I have a metal-on-metal rubbing noise from the front end. After doing some reading around here, I took off the serpentine belt and spun each pulley by hand. The tensioner pulley had a ton of play so that seems to be my culprit. I also picked up a mechanics stethoscope at HF and confirmed it to be the problem.

I know I can purchase an entire new tensioner assembly with the pulley (and people recommend rockauto for doing so) but I was hoping to save some money and only pick up the pulley that's bad and not the entire assembly. I read on here that the Gates #36173 can be used to replace tensioner pulley, but I believe it was in reference to the 4.0L. I was hoping to confirm that the same thing would work on the 2.7L.

Has anyone successfully replaced their stock tensioner pulley with a Gates #36173 pulley on a 2nd gen 2.7L?

 

To answer my own question, it does appear to work just fine.

Also, I read that the tensioner pulley bolt is LH threaded, but it was definitely lefty-loosey for me.

 

I just did my tensioner pulley the same way as you did (with the gates #36173) - seems to work perfectly. Any updates from your repair? Still running like a top?

 

Yup, still going strong.