Thread: Don't ignore a chirping poly-v belt !

I had a chirping belt on my engine and I was intending to change it however I ran out of time before I had to go to hospital for radioiodine therapy,

On my way up the M1 and the engine watchdog hit 105 and started going off, after a minute or so the temp dropped a few degrees so I kept going

Next thing the temp shot up to 112! Luckily i was near a turning bay so I braked hard and stopped the engine. It was at 117 for maybe 30 secs.

Upon inspection the belt had started to lose strips off the side, the belt was there but half as wide Some of the strips which had come off had wrapped around the fan and stopped it working which explained the initial temperature rise. One of the heater hoses had blown off the thermostat which explained the sudden temp rise !

Got it home on a tow truck and used the spare car to go to hospital a few hours late.

Once I took the old belt off I saw that the idler pulley was loose, arrrghh. I replaced it and put some permatex blue on the bolt for added security

So the moral of the story is, if your poly-v belt is chirping, at the very least take it off and check everything

Oh and things like the Engine Watchdog are very well worth fitting to these vehicles. Almost compulsory

No damage seems to have been sustained anywhere that I can see

In future I am only going to use Jubilee Clips on my hoses as well, it seems that once those factory ones get a boit old they lose their grip


Steve

It seems that my radiator bottom tank did not survive the cooling system stress test either

I had planned to fit an Aussie Desert cooler before the summer heat kicked in so now that plan has been moved forward to now !

Steve