The riveted versions were never meant to be repaired. And Hustler does have a better pulley to replace these which is a commercial grade one piece pulley. It is only about $3 more.
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As for tightwad comment it was meant to put things in prospective as when you charge $80 per for labor you can't charge the customer for 2-3 hrs work and reinstalled an used pulley. All that time would have to be written off costing the shop a profit and the possibility of still having to install a new pulley and belt. For a DIYer it is fine to waste time that otherwise could be used for more profitable endeavors.
That is a nice looking pulley! When one of my idler pulleys locked up,while waiting to receive the replacement,I toyed around with the failed one for just a very few minutes,dulling one drill bit on it. While I most likely had the tools to get it apart,I quickly saw that this was a fools errand and tossed it in the trash. A for-profit shop must make a profit to be there tomorrow. A wasted hour of labor is a double loss,lost money on this job and lost money on the job you should have been doing with that wasted time. I'm retired and have time to spare for repairs,but taking forever to get a $25 pulley apart to put $35 worth of bearings and bolts and nuts to get it back in service? Nope.
This pic is what I used to have to repair back to as close to new as possible,before I retired. Try to imagine,if you will, the sheer number of parts needed to get this Freightliner back on the road. One mistake or one untorqued bolt could result in disaster. Not many of the younger workers have the dedication to pay that much attention to detail. (edit) Speaking of paying attention to detail-just a few moments of not paying attention resulted in this driver rear-ending the truck he was following,resulting in quite the wreck.