420A Serpentine Belt

[Areaves03]

Hi! I’m new to working on eclipses and quite lacking education on them! I have a 98’ eclipse gs, non-turbo, upon getting this car my only real problem is the serpentine belt squealing non-stop, (note this car sat two years prior before I got it) I narrowed it down to the area for the serpentine belt and all the pulleys. I have replaced the tensioner pulley and the tensioner bolt along with the serpentine belt about 3 months ago and the squealing persists. I was told it could’ve been the power steering pump as I was told it sounds like a bearing, so I replaced the power steering pump and pulley and to no avail… it still squeaks. But! Now it really only makes noise if it hasn’t been running for 30+mins or if I’m pressing on the gas. Spraying water on the belt does make the sound disappear completely but as you know water dissipates fairly fast, I’m aware deodorant and belt conditioners are a bad idea but had to try and as you can figure it did nothing. I’ve worked on cars with my dad my entire life and he just keeps telling me the belt just needs time to get worked in the pulleys to loose the paint on them and I find that untrue! As I mentioned I’m fairly new to working on eclipses and any tips or tricks will be very much appreciated! Thank you! Aly

 

[Xarzor]

I'm not familiar with the 420a. Is that a manual tensioner or automatic? I'm assuming it's one belt that runs everything? Could it be an idler pulley or maybe another accessory with a failing bearing?

 

[Areaves03]

It’s an automatic but I’ll be checking the idler pulley next, none of the pulleys have any play in them, but I have read for other cars it could be making the noise if the pulleys aren’t leveled with the others? Currently I’m just going down the list of replacing thing.

 

[Dericsh]

I’m not a 420a person either but, if applicable- Make sure the rubber in the harmonic balancer isn’t coming apart.

 

[Areaves03]

I’m not a 420a person either but, if applicable- Make sure the rubber in the harmonic balancer isn’t coming apart.

The car isn’t shaking engine runs fine, I thought normally if those go out your car shakes more often? I may be wrong but I appreciate the idea!

 

[Dericsh]

The car isn’t shaking engine runs fine, I thought normally if those go out your car shakes more often? I may be wrong but I appreciate the idea!

Yeah that is more of a side effect when it’s really failing I would guess. But, If it’s original it’s 24 year old rubber. Maybe the squeak is the first warning sign. Just something to check if you run out of other options.

 

[Nickolision]

A good alternative to the squeaking belt is to remove the whole pulley assembly and run a smaller belt

 

[BLACK'98DSM]

I see this question asked a lot about the 420a and it's usually improper tension on the belt.