ok i have a quick question about changing the serpinetine belt on my 92 RS (5.0L). The box the belt came in has some not so discriptive instructions about adjusting tension on the belt, and on the tensioner pulley the marks are off a little. Can I just put the new belt on as is or do I need to adjust the tensioner pulley before I put the new belt on?

 

tensioner is self adjusting. No need to mess with anything, just pop a ratchet in there, pull, drop the old belt, route the new belt and put the tensioner back in place, as far as i know the only way to "fix" then tensioner is to replace it

Good Luck

 

That would be correct, I've never heard of a way to adjust a tensioner, you would replace it.

 

Yeah, its that easy. Pop the ratchet on there and on and off it goes quickly. It should take you only a couple of minutes. No adjustment needed.

 

the only "adjustable" tensioner ive ever seen is on mitsubishi style motors, annoying pieces of garbage and reverse threaded if i remember correctly, i watched my friend over tension multiple belts on his eclipse and just burn thru them like crazy

 

how do you know when to change the tensioner pulley? my car has around 200,000 miles on it. should I change that as well or just go ahead and put the belt on it?

 

Just put the belt on. You would change the tensioner if the spring was shot (I've NEVER in 17years of owning 3rd gens seen one needing it).

 

same here. If your belt is new and slipping then you have an issue but if its not broken dont fix it. And in case theres any confusion if you buy a cheap belt then youll have issues but thats only in the useful life of it, ive used everything from gatorback belts to cheap autozones and the only issue is how long it lasts and ive never known anyone to need to replace the tensioners on these cars

 

Okay, thanks for the help.