Squealing from belt/pulley?????

[2000XPLORERSPORT]

I got a 2000 explorer 4.0 ohv. for years i would get that dreaded high pitch sound from the belt. now sometimes it was just from getting wet from car wash etc..... then the tensioner went bad. it would get stuck in the out position and not give when you gave it gas. so it put too much tension on the belt and caused it to squeal. so i bought a new tensioner and belt. was fine for a couple months then the squeal was back. i thought the tensioner i just got was a faulty one, so i replaced it. the squeal still came & went. so i bought 1 more tensioner and i cleaned every pulley, and every fan blade while i had access to it. but it mostly just squeals when i first start it, then goes away. sometime it will make a little squeal while driving. i checked every pulley when i had the belt off and they all seemed fine. except the a/c compressor pulley. it had a little side to side play in it.

so i was thinking, since idon't use the a/c because i have a leak somewhere so the freon leaks out.

is there a shorter belt i can buy and bypass the a/c unit? it probably would cause the squeal to go away, plus i would think i would pick uo a few ponies by not having to spin the a/c pulley. now the a/c pulley spins really easy. but im sure bypassing it, i would get a few horsepower. plus hopefully the d*mn squeal!!!

so if anyone has some advise or know if there is a shorter belt i can get i would greatly appreciate it!!!

sorry for the long message, i just wanted to tell as much info as i could.

Thank you!

 

[ptf18]

Had a squeal noise on the serpentine belt on a 88 Jeep. Found that it wasn't the belt but rather a out of track PS pulley that caused the belt to slide to its left and right as it traveled around the pump pulley. That sideways sliding over the pulley made the NEW belt squeal. I changed out the pulley and it "fixed it"

Might be your A/C pulley going "in and out" doing the same to the belt as my PS pump did to me. YOU say it had a little side to side play

 

[2000XPLORERSPORT]

Had a squeal noise on the serpentine belt on a 88 Jeep. Found that it wasn't the belt but rather a out of track PS pulley that caused the belt to slide to its left and right as it traveled around the pump pulley. That sideways sliding over the pulley made the NEW belt squeal. I changed out the pulley and it "fixed it"

Might be your A/C pulley going "in and out" doing the same to the belt as my PS pump did to me. YOU say it had a little side to side play

Yea, could be. it looks like the belt it going around straight, but it probably don't take much to make a squeal.