Revolutionary:
You are quite right you should not have collective to yaw coupling happening in normal flight. As you probably all ready know if the collective is fully down and you push peddle will want to increase the collective up, same if you have full collective pulled up will move the pedals. ( on the ground with hydraulic test rig hooked up to see this)
If cables recently changed I would suspect your tension might not have been set right, possibly to high. If the cables were replaced as per the manual with the two rigging pins installed forward and aft quadrants should not have affected the rigging.
As you mentioned binding pulley bearings you all ready checked, other area´s I have seen in the past cause this is forward or aft quadrant pivot bearings binding, possibly bearing on the top deck with either collective or tail rotor ( I would suspect the tail rotor bell cranks more likely to cause this issue), make sure even the cotter pins have been installed correctly, I have seen in the past on the S76 a cotter pin making contact with the upper deck and the pilot could feel it in the controls.