Hobie V2 Idler Pulley Replacement

Before a recent adventure in my little Hobie Sport I noticed, upon inspecting my pedals, that I had developed a crack in the idler pulley in my V2 pedal drive.    I remember hearing some annoying squeaks on a few previous trips but was unable to deduce what was causing it.  I’m pretty sure this was the culprit and it was likely from having the cable adjusted too tight.     I did some online searching and Hobie apparently no longer make the V2 idler pulley replacement part, but all the forums said the GT idler pulley would work.  So, after checking at a local Hobie retailer, who did not have the part, I ordered it online from Austin Kayak.  I just made the swap on parts this afternoon and it seems to be working just fine.  It was not difficult except for trying not to spill all those graphite bearings in the GT pulley.   You know what they say, “Idler hands are the devil’s playthings.”   You know I always wanted to be the center of a tension.

Nice!

You might want to consider upgrading to full GT, as it does seem to offer a noticeable improvement in performance.

Btw, the bearings are not graphite, they're delrin, and they like to squeak if you don't grease them. And, for me at least, they continue to squeak no matter what I do. So, on my GT drives, I replaced all of the delrin bearings with nylon rods of the same diameter (0.125"). If you do this, be sure to use one less bearing per axle.

Since changing over to nylon, I've had no squeaking ever, and there's no grease to trap grit. As an added bonus, nylon bearings seem to last forever...

Interesting... "delrin"... I had to look it up.  I did consider buying the entire "kit" to upgrade to GT since I got a GT drive with my latest addition to my fleet, a used 2016 outback.  I like the GT drive,  but I decided to "keep it simple" on this one and just replace the idler pulley.  I did apply a bit of grease upon reassemble.  It's nice to have three working drives now.