What's this belt squeal? (1 Viewer)

[eatSleepWoof]

I've had this squealing on and off for a while, but lately it has gotten considerably worse. Just went for a 30 min drive and it was squealing the entire time, up until I shut the car off.

It's a 2014, with ~60k km / 37k miles.

Video:



When looking at the opened hood it seems like the noise is coming from the upper passenger side.

Is that noise from the serpentine belt? A tensioner or pulley somewhere? Anyone have a rough idea of hours/cost to replace?

 

[grinchy]

I had replaced one serpentine belt in my life. To replace the idler pulley tensioner and belt took about an hour. About half of that was removing and putting back on the skid plate etc. just the belt is probably less than 10 min, excluding armor. The pulley and tensioner add maybe 20 min more.
Faster if you have an impact I guess. The dayco kit was $125 us

 

[eatSleepWoof]

I had replaced one serpentine belt in my life. To replace the idler pulley tensioner and belt took about an hour. About half of that was removing and putting back on the skid plate etc. just the belt is probably less than 10 min, excluding armor. The pulley and tensioner add maybe 20 min more.
Faster if you have an impact I guess. The dayco kit was $125 us

Great, thank you. I'll probably have the local Indy do it, but it's great to know that it's not a huge job.

 

[04UZJ100]

Spray the belt with water. If the squeal goes away you know it’s just the belt itself.

 

[tacoduck]

I have the same belt chirp as well. I wonder if just swapping the belt would be a good place to start. Mine is a 15 with 57k miles on it.

 

[TeCKis300]

Spray the belt with water. If the squeal goes away you know it’s just the belt itself.

Conversely, if the squeal increases with a spray of water, could be indicative of the tensioner not applying enough tension and failing.

 

[04UZJ100]

Conversely, if the squeal increases with a spray of water, could be indicative of the tensioner not applying enough tension and failing.

Interesting. I have been troubleshooting a squeal and it’s only apparent when I leave the truck out overnight And startup on damp mornings. If I leave it in the garage. No squeal.

If I spray it with water when sitting outside, noise increases momentarily and then disappears.

Any thoughts?

 

[bloc]

Conversely, if the squeal increases with a spray of water, could be indicative of the tensioner not applying enough tension and failing.

Having had a 3UR tensioner in hand a couple weeks ago.. I’m confident “not enough tension” will not be a common problem. It is a huge spring and well anchored in there. There isn’t even much change in spring rate from both stops of its travel.. it is well designed.

Now the bearings in that pulley.. that’s another issue altogether. Much smaller than in the idler, though the tensioner is larger diameter and would turn less RPMs.

 

[TeCKis300]

That does sound like the classic tensioner issue. How many miles on the motor now? How cold out is it?

It could be other things like a failing component/component bearing making things harder to turn. Or misalignment of components. Those are not as common. Or the belt itself (but bad belts are usually a symptom of another root cause).

First thing to attack with these symptoms belt and tensioner. Check that everything else is spinning smoothly while you're in there.

 

[bloc]

OP use a mirror to check the back of your water pump pulley for pink crust. Also look down below the pump nose.

 

[RandyCSVT]

probably your belt. Go with an OEM belt. I had an aftermarket brand i picked up at pepboys and it started squealing 8k miles after i installed it. removed it and replaced with OEM and have been squeal free for many thousands of miles.

 

[ElJayBird]

I've had this squealing on and off for a while, but lately it has gotten considerably worse. Just went for a 30 min drive and it was squealing the entire time, up until I shut the car off.

It's a 2014, with ~60k km / 37k miles.

When looking at the opened hood it seems like the noise is coming from the upper passenger side.

Is that noise from the serpentine belt? A tensioner or pulley somewhere? Anyone have a rough idea of hours/cost to replace?

I have this EXACT same noise. Also a 2014 but with 92k on the odometer.

I was going to replace the belt and pulley myself but being lazy and also needing a tranny flush, I'm dropping it off at the local dealership tomorrow. I'll let you know what they find.

 

[eatSleepWoof]

I have this EXACT same noise. Also a 2014 but with 92k on the odometer.

I was going to replace the belt and pulley myself but being lazy and also needing a tranny flush, I'm dropping it off at the local dealership tomorrow. I'll let you know what they find.

Looking forward to hearing it (the solution, not the squeal, heh)!

 

[ElJayBird]

It was the tensioner pulley on mine

 

[eatSleepWoof]

It was the tensioner pulley on mine

Thanks for confirming!

 

[MHFJ]

Having had a 3UR tensioner in hand a couple weeks ago.. I’m confident “not enough tension” will not be a common problem. It is a huge spring and well anchored in there. There isn’t even much change in spring rate from both stops of its travel.. it is well designed.

Now the bearings in that pulley.. that’s another issue altogether. Much smaller than in the idler, though the tensioner is larger diameter and would turn less RPMs.

When I replaced my tensioner last weekend, the new one was far more difficult to release tension on than the old one. Not sure if it had been changed before, but have 150k on the truck.

 

[Supra88]

I would recommend new belt and tensioner, OEM only. The other bearings are pretty stout, but check them while you or someone else is in there. Tensioner exploded on mine at around 100k taking out a bunch of stuff. For context, my idler and fan bracket pulley we're still fine when I swapped them out at 228k miles.

 

[fj40crusher]

Also proud owner of recently squealing belt after this cold ass weather. Super annoying and intermittent issue.

 

[tincan45]

My 2014 with 128K just started doing this as well. Anyone have OEM belt and tensioner part numbers handy for the lazy?

 

[TLC2013]

My 2014 with 128K just started doing this as well. Anyone have OEM belt and tensioner part numbers handy for the lazy?

Here you go. The part numbers are Included the list here that I used when I refreshed my 2013’s cooling system after experiencing the cracked radiator.