Serpentine Belt Help

[jbthompson]

Hi everyone! I have had my 2002 V6 EB Explorer for overt a year now. I drove it off the lot with a squeak. Now that it's cold it's gotten louder, so I took it into a Goodyear dealer last week. They said the drive belt needs to be changed and that the "spring" was loose. Are they talking about the tensioner? They want to charge me 230 bucks

I have 64k miles, and the belt looks good. It looks easy to change out of the haynes manual. Where can I get the belt? Should I replace the tensioner as well? How hard is this job?

 

[Heavymentill]

Its very easy, remove the intake tube to have better access to the tensioner. The tensioner is the lower left spring loaded pulley. Take a 3/8 socket wrench insert it into the square hole on the tensioner. Push down and towards the left to remove tension from the belt to remove it. One bolt removes the tensioner. Reverse procedure to reinstall.

 

[CaptainObvious]

Could be the idler pulley. Wife had a saturn that did something very similar. It was the pulley

 

[trucku]

tensioner is about $37 bucks and comes with pulley ( mine needed to be changed)
Idler pulley was like $15 ( I changed) I have 70k on truck now.
Replace the belt..I got Dayco for $39 bucks (daycos have 1 year warranty too) from PepBoys.


DO IT YOURSELF !!! ITS EASY!!!!!


Take a wire brush and clean all the grooved metal (Mine had buildup you wouldn't even notice) pulleys and then spray them with cleaner and wipe dry with cloth. Don't put spray any plastic pulleys.


$230 is insane!

 

[X6StringerX]

It really pays to do repairs/maintenance like this yourself. Shops will you chew you up and spit you out. They almost always charge a couple hundred bucks for even the simplest job. They take for granted that most people don't know much about vehicles. Aside from that, a $20 repair here and a $40 repair there just isn't worth their time.

 

[trucku]

For all that they would have charged, the dirty pulleys would have never gotten cleaned at all and would might lead to belt failure again. The service will be minimal, just a part swap. I am still looking for a good mechanic in NY to take care of my truck under extended warranty. Recently I went in to get my cruise control fixed...3 days later and nothing..then all of a sudden they wanted to bill my warranty 360 dollars for a "diagnostic" charge to find the problem. OK whatever....so for three days they did nothing. I didn't approve that. I don't need issues with my coverage. I will go someplace else. Cruise control is still dead.

 

[jbthompson]

Hey guys! Thanks for the replys. I got a gatorback v belt, replaced myself in less than 10 minutes, and the squeak is gone. I'm so glad i did it myself, it was EASY! Thanks for all the help!