BB427, You are not losing your mind. I have seen both styles of balancer pulley. This entire situation just doesnt add up for me. The water pump was "sheared off" with bolts hanging out? Granted the pump is cast aluminum most likely, but ive never seen a pump shear. This just doesnt add up for me. how did the timing cover fair? was it bashed in at all??? Post more pictures... I want to see this distruction

 

Not by the bolts, the crank pulley flew off while he was "getting on it". I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to be standing in the pulley's path as it goes flying off at 5-6k rpm. What happened makes sense to me.

 

I seen a balancer come off at the track. That this hit the ground and shot straight into the wall, ran up the wall and came down on the car. Sparking the whole way, lol. I was frozen, I lost track of it for a second. My favorite spot is leaning against the fence at the starting line.

Never seen a pump come of without something hitting it.

 

The engine was at about 7400rpm when this happened. The pump did not "shear" off, it snapped off, the outlet on the pump to be exact. The timing cover is just fine, because the balancer was there still. I have also seen a balancer explode on the dyno. It was supposed to be an SFI aproved balancer, actually it was stock with an SFI sticker slapped on it. It put holes all over the dyno room, a huge dent in the concrete, broken water pump, and it crushed the fuel cell. That happend on a 7500rpm small block as well.

 

I've seen all sorts of big damage done when things let go on the front of the engine. Saw a fan come off at around 5,000 rpm's on a friend's car that shot stright through two laers of steel hood and exited up!
Saw a harmonic balancer explode and put pieces through the hood and fenders, plus sheared the water pump shaft, but the water pump was still there. Never seen a water pump break it's mounting bolts, but I can see how it could happen under the right circumstances.