The pulley removal tool from parlourforce is great bit of kit, well worth £30.
Saves a lot of messing about converting something else to do the job.
Only thing is to make it fit my pulley I had to drill it out to 9mm and get some M8x35 cap bolts and washers. Don't know if this is because my car is a small turbo with A/C, but I think all escorts have M8 threads in the pulley(sierras have the M6). I found it best to run a tap up the threads in the pulley first as mine were rusty as hell.
Hope the auxiliary belt tip helps, didn't like the idea about cranking the engine over with a breaker bar jammed on the pulley. Sounds like a recipe for big repair bills if it goes wrong