NoSlo
SHO Owner
You look so nice when you are new...
Even your coil is pretty:
But then you go and do this:
And before you break the serpentine belt, you chew away on the coil and turn it into melted char.
OK, pulley, I'm stuck far from home, but we can bypass you with a 70.25" belt says some painful forum cel phone browsing. Here's my illustration of other's words:
But you're not done yet, AC pulley, because that $34 belt is destroyed soon after when it rips into engine block metal, because you did this to the harmonic balancer:
And that crank pulley eats into the timing cover before it starts squealing into the metal lip on the bottom of the engine. And I'm only mildly far from home.
Get another short belt since the last one was shredded. Discover that it didn't just die prematurely from the weird bypass; it was from aforementioned pulley. Luckily this was discovered by double-checking the belt, it was being thrown out of the grooves and rubbing, something wrong here. Discover that the ATX harmonic balancer separating is not rare.
OK, we get a new crank pulley and new lower timing cover put on. Now there's a horrific bearing-gone-bad squealing sound that starts shortly after; we replace all the idler pulleys, still there. We bypass the water pump by taking of it's pulley, sound is still there. We get a new power steering pump and put it on, purge the system, ...and still there. How about an alternator (I have two that make neither noise nor electricity). Nope.
WTF. Take off the belt, and it's nice and quiet still without a belt, it's not the engine. Could something IN the engine make noise only when the serpentine belt is on?? The crank pulley? I re-tightened that bolt up so hard that the next starter bump to loosen it sheared a 1/2" to 3/8' adapter in half. Super tight, and still noise. The tensioner still feels as strong, but we'll get another and replace it too...
Well here's the trick, I guess. I gift the forum this rarely seen ATX tensioner guide with impossible to notice marks indicated:
At some point I must have thought that weird idler pulley wrap for bypass was redundant, so I removed the top pulley. This shortened the belt path and made too-little tension, creating a noise like metal-on-metal like something was going to fall of the car; nothing at all like a belt slipping noise. I finally was spraying each idler pulley bearing with WD40 through a long tube while the engine was running, and the noise stopped for a bit. Spray more, maybe it quiets down...Hrm. Douse the belt in belt conditioner spray, it's quiet - until the stuff dries. Aha, belt. Why? OK, I put the other pulley back in and wrap the belt the original way, and it's friggin quiet again! About a dozen battery-pulls later...
Well, now it's time to try to get off the AC clutch snap ring while the AC compressor is still in the car (I can spin the shaft with my fingertips so the compressor is fine), put on my new AC pulley (the old bearing still spins but feels gummy), buy another belt, and it better be done.
.. anybody need a power steering pump, serpentine tensioner, or any number of idler pulleys from my car, four wrecking yard trips later?
Even your coil is pretty:
But then you go and do this:
And before you break the serpentine belt, you chew away on the coil and turn it into melted char.
OK, pulley, I'm stuck far from home, but we can bypass you with a 70.25" belt says some painful forum cel phone browsing. Here's my illustration of other's words:
But you're not done yet, AC pulley, because that $34 belt is destroyed soon after when it rips into engine block metal, because you did this to the harmonic balancer:
And that crank pulley eats into the timing cover before it starts squealing into the metal lip on the bottom of the engine. And I'm only mildly far from home.
Get another short belt since the last one was shredded. Discover that it didn't just die prematurely from the weird bypass; it was from aforementioned pulley. Luckily this was discovered by double-checking the belt, it was being thrown out of the grooves and rubbing, something wrong here. Discover that the ATX harmonic balancer separating is not rare.
OK, we get a new crank pulley and new lower timing cover put on. Now there's a horrific bearing-gone-bad squealing sound that starts shortly after; we replace all the idler pulleys, still there. We bypass the water pump by taking of it's pulley, sound is still there. We get a new power steering pump and put it on, purge the system, ...and still there. How about an alternator (I have two that make neither noise nor electricity). Nope.
WTF. Take off the belt, and it's nice and quiet still without a belt, it's not the engine. Could something IN the engine make noise only when the serpentine belt is on?? The crank pulley? I re-tightened that bolt up so hard that the next starter bump to loosen it sheared a 1/2" to 3/8' adapter in half. Super tight, and still noise. The tensioner still feels as strong, but we'll get another and replace it too...
Well here's the trick, I guess. I gift the forum this rarely seen ATX tensioner guide with impossible to notice marks indicated:
At some point I must have thought that weird idler pulley wrap for bypass was redundant, so I removed the top pulley. This shortened the belt path and made too-little tension, creating a noise like metal-on-metal like something was going to fall of the car; nothing at all like a belt slipping noise. I finally was spraying each idler pulley bearing with WD40 through a long tube while the engine was running, and the noise stopped for a bit. Spray more, maybe it quiets down...Hrm. Douse the belt in belt conditioner spray, it's quiet - until the stuff dries. Aha, belt. Why? OK, I put the other pulley back in and wrap the belt the original way, and it's friggin quiet again! About a dozen battery-pulls later...
Well, now it's time to try to get off the AC clutch snap ring while the AC compressor is still in the car (I can spin the shaft with my fingertips so the compressor is fine), put on my new AC pulley (the old bearing still spins but feels gummy), buy another belt, and it better be done.
.. anybody need a power steering pump, serpentine tensioner, or any number of idler pulleys from my car, four wrecking yard trips later?
Last edited:
) and i've replaced my AC compressor.
Sold that car, on my MTX I just run the solid shosource UDP and don't have to worry about it.
