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Yes, if you don't address it Posted by Ari [Email] ![]() ![]() In Reply to: squealing belt at high exceleration..start of something bad? n/m, bens 88 9kt, Mon, 10 Sep 2001 17:38:01 Members do not see ads below this line. - Help Keep This Site Online - Signup |
There can be a bunch of reasons for the squeal.
If the serpentine belt is loose or worn, it'll squeal under load. The downside there is that at some point the belt will break and leave you stranded. Inspect the belt for wear, shiny spots, that sort of thing. Tension is a hard one to measure. Place your thumb on the belt midway between the tensioner and the PS pump pulley (ENGINE OFF!!!!) and press down. It shoud deflect about 1/4 to 1/2 inch under 'moderate' pressure. Now, I can't say what 'moderate' is, other than you should need to press relatively hard.
The main pulley at the crankshaft (also known as the 'Harmonic Balancer') is actually a sandwich of two pulleys with rubber in the middle. That rubber dries up and dies over time. The usual symptom is a squeal at startup. I guess you could also get a squeal under hard acceleration. If the pulley separates, it will either fly apart (stranding you), or back into the oil pump cover. If it chews through the oil pump cover, you'll lose all your oil and sieze the engine. Not a good idea. Draw a chalk line across the pulley, and start the engine a few times, and go for a drive and see if it'll squeal. Then check to see if the chalk line still lines up - if not, the pulley has shifted, and needs replacement immediately.
Lastly, how are your motor mounts? Look at the 'dogbone' between the top of the engine and the frame. Are the rubber inserts badly cracked? This is a torsion mount; the motor mounts are at the bottom of the engine, but harder to see. If the bottom mounts are shot, it'll rip apart the upper torsion bar. You'll also get a lot of engine movement under acceleration. It's possible that the engine is moving enough that a pulley - AC pulley, driveshaft, whatever, is impacting something it shouldn't.
Open the hood and check things out. You don't want to trash an engine for a $10 belt.
posted by 140.157....
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