Whining sound-- new water pump, alternator, and belt

[RupertSportSpider]

As the title says, there's a pretty terrible whining sound, and I think it's either the water pump, the alternator, or the V-belt, all of which are new. I loosened the tension a little on the V-belt to no avail, and the the belt now has slightly more than the required ~0.5 inch of play between the water pump and alternator pulleys. Thoughts?

Here's a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D60DuL_m ... e=youtu.be

In other news, obviously I got the alternator on there and got it full o' coolant, so thanks for that help. I ended up having a bushing made to extend the alternator pulley out far enough. Bit of an ordeal, that.

Now it drives (and pretty well, other than the whining), but there are a pile of electrical issues I didn't pick up on before, such as the oil pressure gauge, the speedo, the radiator fan, the heater fan, and the turn signals all not working.

[azruss]

sounds like you've got a radial arm saw under the hood. sounds like belt rub to me. either timing or alt. might want to give it the mechanic's stethoscope (tube stuck in ear) treatment and see if you can locate the origin of the sound. start with the alternator.

[So Cal Mark]

was the timing belt replaced also? If so, it might be too tight

[RupertSportSpider]

Timing belt is new, but done previously by the PO. It didn't make that sound when I got the car.

My first thought is to loosen the belt some more, and then to try a different belt brand. It's also possible that the pulley isn't perfectly aligned, given my previous troubles with that.

I'll try the tube-in-ear method, but it's so loud that I'd be surprised if that helped. It doesn't sound like it's coming from anywhere specific, with all the bouncing sound waves under there.

[RRoller123]

I thought the tension on the timing belt is automatically set by the spring?

[dmwhiteoak]

Pull the alt belt and run it for a sec. See if it disappears.

[Danno]

Pull the alt belt and run it for a sec. See if it disappears.

I was going to suggest this too, but I think the older spiders run on one belt.

[vandor]

> It's also possible that the pulley isn't perfectly aligned, given my previous troubles with that.

I would say that is the most likely cause, since you had to mess with that. You should be able to eyeball it and see if all 3 pullies are aligned.

[RupertSportSpider]

Good news is the work I did (alt, w pump, V-belt) is not making the sound. The bad news is I'm pretty sure it's the timing belt. I pulled the V-belt off completely and ran it for a little bit, and there was no change to the whining sound. Then I pulled off the timing belt cover. I have in internal t-stat, which I replaced. I don't think anything with the timing belt changed, but since I had to pull the cover off to do the t-stat, there is a possibility of that. :huh:

There are two things that jump out to me, but I am no kind of expert on belts and stuff. The first is that the belt was pretty much right against the back of the cam pulleys. The other is that I think the belt, being so far back, was rubbing (see below photo with the arrow-- the red thing in the lower right is a flashlight). I have no idea if the tension is right or not.



Can I retension the timing belt (but it looks like an auto-tensioner to me)?

[vandor]

No, the timing can't be re-tensioned, you would risk breaking it.
Do some of the pulleys have a flange on their rear side?

[JConnerly]

Just from looking at your picture I'm wondering if the po replaced the tensioner bearing when he replaced the belt. Mine went out and it made a high pitched whine that didn't go away whe I took the v belt off and ran it for a minute. ( not too long, no water pump with it off). If you replace the timing belt it is wise to replace the tensioner bearing at the same time, and easy too!

[Daniel]

I have seen the tension bearing make noise like that as well when going out.

[RupertSportSpider]

No, the timing can't be re-tensioned, you would risk breaking it.
Do some of the pullers have a flange on their rear side?

I kind of thought so. One of the cam pulleys has a flange on the back, and the other has a flange on the front.

Sounds like I'm re-replacing the timing belt and tensioner. This is a most unfortunate turn of events. Also today, I broke the key off in the ignition.

[RupertSportSpider]

And thanks for the replies, even though the news is poopy!

[pluktv]

Looks like an identical problem I had earlier this year. Check my post under "Timing belt misalignment" - It turned out to be the aux pully, but it could have been easily the tensioner bearing. Good luck