Belt Squealing When I Crank My Car?

[ma4220]

The belt makes an awful squeal when I crank my car. I know it's the belt but I was wondering if anyone could help me narrow down which one it might be without messin with both of them. If I'm guessing right, one should be loose. I just put new belts on there this past weekend, and it was a pain!!! So I might not have got them tight enough. If someone could help me it would be great.

[code58]

The belt makes an awful squeal when I crank my car. I know it's the belt but I was wondering if anyone could help me narrow down which one it might be without messin with both of them. If I'm guessing right, one should be loose. I just put new belts on there this past weekend, and it was a pain!!! So I might not have got them tight enough. If someone could help me it would be great.

What kind of belts (brand) did you use? I put a new Dayco Alt./ AC belt on my DIL's RX and it would squeal whenever you started it for about a half a second. The belt was definitely tight enough. i went crazy tearing stuff apart for almost a whole day. When i could find nothing to explain it I thought to put the old one back on. Squeal gone! I miced the belt and found it was a faintly different angle on the v-grooves than the original. I took it back and used Toyota/ Lexus belts and have had no problem since. To top it off the list price on the original belts was less than the aftermarket belts! Good Luck, hope this helps.

P.S. I feel it is the alt. that is just enough of a drag on the belt until it is spun up to speed that is causing the problem. Even if the A/C is on, it is disabled in start position on the key so no drag is possible there. It only takes a half second to get the weight of the stator up to speed. If you didn't use original eq. belts I'm betting that is the problem. I didn't want to tighten the belts any tighter to stop the squeal because they were already tight enough and i knew that even though that would probably stop the squeal, it would be hard on the alt. bearings.

[Grumpa72]

First, do you have a surpentine belt or individual belts? I thought all cars had serpentine belts.

Try some troubleshooting. Turn off your a/c, all accessories, including lights. Then start the car and see if the belt squeeks. While idling, start adding accessories like rear defroster, headlights, turn signals, heater, radio, etc LEAVE THE A/C off. If it is your alternator belt, the increased electrical load should cause it to squeel. If you don't get squeeling, turn off most of the accessories and add the a/c. If your compressor is putting a heavy load on it, it will squeel. The last belt, at least in my older cars is the power steering belt. If no squeeling with the first two, start moving the steering wheel back and forth to see if the PS pump is causing the squeeling.

There are devices to measure belt tension but I use the old TLAR method - That Looks About Right - by depressing the belt. If I get more than about 3/4" the belt is too loose.

[code58]

First, do you have a surpentine belt or individual belts? I thought all cars had serpentine belts.

Try some troubleshooting. Turn off your a/c, all accessories, including lights. Then start the car and see if the belt squeeks. While idling, start adding accessories like rear defroster, headlights, turn signals, heater, radio, etc LEAVE THE A/C off. If it is your alternator belt, the increased electrical load should cause it to squeel. If you don't get squeeling, turn off most of the accessories and add the a/c. If your compressor is putting a heavy load on it, it will squeel. The last belt, at least in my older cars is the power steering belt. If no squeeling with the first two, start moving the steering wheel back and forth to see if the PS pump is causing the squeeling.

There are devices to measure belt tension but I use the old TLAR method - That Looks About Right - by depressing the belt. If I get more than about 3/4" the belt is too loose.

I was talking about the little v-grooves in the serpentine belt.

[Grumpa72]

Ok, now I understand. I assumed, incorrectly of course, that you were talking about multiple belts and that didn't make sense. How is your belt tensioner?