I think some of the friday the 13th bad luck has swung my way. Just as I was thinking to myself this morning "geez I have not had to do much in terms of repairs this summer" I starting hearing this ratteling noise from under the hood.

You guys know that aluminum (or whatever it is) bracket which your AC compressor, smog pump and belt tensioner go on which then bolts up to the block? Well lets just say when I took a look at things to investigate the noise under my hood I saw this bracket vibrating a good bit!

As I recall the bracket is held in place at three points, and well somehow one of those mounting bolts was gone all together, the second mounting point the stud was sheared right off, and well the third mounting point was just starting to vibrate loose! Good thing I caught it when I did because I don't want to even start to imagine what would have happened if it "fell off" all together!

So my question for you guys is the following, given that this thing is mounted on only at two points instead of the three (have to drill and tap the one) do you guys think its ok to drive the car???? I am about 95% sure that its alright for me to drive it and then just do the final fix in the winter when the car is being stored, but what do you guys think??? I would probably only put on another 2,000 km max this year before putting it away for the winter and then working on it, what do you guys think??


Advise??

 

You got the right belt on there? My whole setup is 14 years old and has never broken anything. The tensioner spring's pulley took a dive and started grinding, but never had a case like that.

Usually when something breaks in that department, the wrong belt for the application has been put on. Too much tension will bust anything under load.

Is it safe? Hard to tell... when you rev it up does the tensioner indication vary much? if it shoots out of spec on the indicator when revving, I wouldn't drive it. If it doesn't budge, you should be fine.

 

Ya things are swiched arroud a little bit, no smog pump, underdrive pully, thus a slightly shorter belt.

I had all those brackets (Both sides of the engine) off a couple of years ago, and then when I needed to do my smog test last winter and slapped on my smog pump again, I think I might have forgotten to put the one bolt which runs thru the bracket, smog pump and then into the block

So what I am thinking happened to cause the breakage, on the stud is that over time since it was probably only held in on two points (on the same side too) it ended up working itself loose and then the vibration got a little too much and snap there goes the stud snapped of in the hole going into the block. I know, I know I should have probably check this a long time ago, but oh well Now I have the fun of drilling and Tapping that snapped stud, I hate doing that stuff!!

I dont think the tensioner indicator moves much, but I will check on that one tonight, if it does not move, then I think its probably ok to drive, only untill I take care of it!