old 3 months old....so young...

It happened when I entered the freeway. I floored the car and it only hit 3 psi. Then I my EGT stopped at 800 even my RPM was still going up. After that, the battery light came up! Ah~ my first thought was "the belt slipped." and I was late for work too. Got off the freeway and went into a gas station. Open up the hood....beautiful! the belt shredded into pieces and I was 10 miles away from home. They battery was dying when I drove back, the lights are getting dimmer and glad that I made it.

whew~ Now I have to replace it. I bought goodyear's gatorback as backup about a month ago and my gf just bought me a set of gear-wrenches for my christmas present. hmmmm....so my new year gift is to get to learn how to change belt for my SC?

oh! one question : how come my brake light went on too? Does it have anything to do with the battery light?

 

A wonderful thing, changing the drive belt....NOT!

If you have any questions on changing the belt check out my old thread in this forum. Just be very careful where every piece goes. I grab a bunch of old envelopes, stuck the bolts in each and labeled them with the hole number. I used the installation guide for that. I didn't see that there were some small washers between the blower and the mounting plate and put them back in the wrong place. That caused a belt misalignment and shredding a brand new belt.

 

ah~ the washer.....when Kevin installed the SC, he noticed the bolt that holds the tensioner adjuster plate was too close to the belt (about 1 mm) and he had to cut off the washer with a dremel and file the bolt a bit. Just recently, the same bolt went loose and it was making that cold-idle rattling. (I thought it was the pulleyes or the timing chain) We tighten it back.

I wonder what caused the belt to be shredded like that (seems like she got raped by Jack the Ripper). I remember that I tensioned the belt correctly. Probably I floored it too hard and the belt jumped a rib.


How long does it take for you to change the belt? I am looking at 5 hours for my first time. I think I need to call for help.

 

When the belt shreds its because it jumped a rib and the edge of the pulley just cuts it off. This basically means an aligment problem with the blower than the pulley.

Took me like 6 hours the first time. Now I'm down to about 4 hours.

 

I just finished replacing my belt and new pulley (3.125) for the first time as well yesterday, and let me tell what I had to go thru...I removed the charger from the car and began to take the hex bolts off but I COULDN'T!! Those things were really in there! I first went thru 2 allen sockets to take off some of the bolts but then my last two bolts were impossible. I went thru 3 more allen sockets for one bolt and it still didn't want to get loose. I was glad that Jay25 gave me some suggestions on what to do. He told me to heat the area around the bolt and tap it with a hammer and unscrew slowly. Well, that's what I did and it finally came off. I spent two days trying to take that damn bolt off, but at least now I know how to remove it. So, if u get stuck on the bolts, heat them up a little cuz it'll save u so much time and headaches! Oh yeah , to take off the pulley was kinda difficult as well. We heated the pulley up a little to make it a little easier. Let us know how it goes!!

~AC

ps. Thanx again Jay25

 

BlackCat: 5 hours?? man....I thought it's faster than that....now it will take me 8 hours for my virginity blower uninstall. I called help today too, he wants me to bring the vehicles to where he lives, about 35 miles.

too bad Kevin's not around.


maxboost00: thx for the advice. I am still evaluating my skill and knowledge too see if I am capable for doing such work. I want to try it, but too affraid to break things...but without trying it, I will never learn. but to learn it, I still have to pay an unkown amount of time/money


need someone to watch me do it....


now I have following options
1.bring her to master 1 (not coming back till mid Jan)
2.bring her to master 2 (need to tow the car 30 miles away)
3.DIY......risky risky risky. may go back to options 1 and 2 if I screw up.

hmmmmmm

 

 

I was thinking of the time starting from jacking the car up to lowering the car after putting everything together..

I recruited my neighbourhood garage to loosen the bolts that hold the blower to the mounting plate. Got that done for free!

 

45 minutes??? u should take ptatohed's bet of 100 dollars on changing pulley under 1 hour. Prob I will DIY....and I need to do a lot of homework.

I used to smoke, for 9 years......until I met my gf and she started to and I finally

 

U should do it yourself. It's not that hard. U can have it done it like six hours. 2 hours to remove, 1-2 hours to change belt and pulley(depending if u have someone to help u)and 2 hours to install again. I should have finished it all in 6 hrs but it ended up being like 10 cuz I couldn't take out those damn bolts. You'll have fun DIY cuz u r learning at the same time,and if u end up taking it out again, it won't be as bad. let us know if u have any problems if u end up doing it youself. LAtes.

~AC

 

I agree. I learn alot about how it is put together and feel better in the long run. I also learned how agonizing it can be when things can go wrong. As I said before, tearing it down for the second time I learned how to put it together again in a faster time.

 

I agree with you two.....I know that I cannot reply on someone forever. I know I will face some troubles for my first time. So I try to do as much homework as I can to make this easier.

I will cut this work into 3 days. I have to either take the car back to my parent's home where I keep all my tools. Or I have to bring the tools to my apartment. I prefer the first one but not sure if my battery will last for this long.

 

Good luck Any homework around my car generally involves a lot of missed sleep, and 3 people, but it gets done eventually with the right tools

Check to see that all belts are aligned properly too... it isn't normal for the belt to hop off like that!

 

thx Jer....another thing I am worried about is having not enought tools. I want to get some flare nut wrenches to remove my tensioner pulley so I will not strip the bolt. Another tool I wanna get is the geared rachate(sp??) wrench to remove the idler pulley. I hope I can handle the rest with my gear wrenches and regular ones.

now I want to move her back to my parents and I need to get the battery charger before I go. It's a 30 mile drive and I prob want someone to follow me home too.