tightening the serpentine/alternator belt

Hi people. Does one have to take the drivers seat out to tighten the alternator belt? Can anyone offer a step by step tutorial or a link. The belt on this 3L 2.8 liter appears to be loose. There is about an inch to 4 cm of play when I press down on it. Any thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.

I would say yes but I have not seen/worked on the 2.8. All other Hiace/Townace engines I have worked on need the driver side floor lifted to reach the adjusting bracket.

Its been a while so memory is fuzzy, but....
Lift the rubber cover in the offside wheel arch...the one that stops muck getting into the side of the engine bay....
In there you will see a 10 mm? tensioning nut....rachet and socket should take up the slack without any dismantling from the top

by offside wheel arch do you mean the passenger side (left side)? it seems any tensioning nut would be over on the right side(drivers side) And does one have to take the wheel off to get at? I took a quick look and didi not see anything. I may just take the drivers seat off when I have time just to see what it looks like.

drivers side...right hand side...lift the rubber and you should clearly see it with a flashlight.
Turn the steering one way or another to make space.....or jack the body a little if needed.
I don't remember having to take off the wheel...

ok so i looked under the mud guard and I can touch the belt and there is a nut that appears to be about 10 mm, but I need an extension on the ratchet to get at it. Also i can't tell if this nut will adjust the tension. It could just be to anchor the alternator.

Well thats the one..on a long length of thread.....its adusts the tension.
It may be that the alternator should be loosened 1st...don't know... but with care it took up the slack for me

The belts are now tight and the alternator is now charging. This has been a learning experience. Firstly, I attempted to adjust the tension with a ratchet. (the nut was a 12 mm). Not realizing I needed to slack off the tension on the adjusting bracket first and consequently stripped the threads. the belts became even more loose and the battery was not charging in cold weather. I had to put the battery on the charger over night to start in the morning. The van ran remarkably well considering it was running down the battery. I took it to someone with a lift and it took him 2 and a half hours to do the job. He welded a bolt onto the broken piece, took the seat out, removed the cover below and the skid plate. He also removed the pulley for the air conditioning to get at the 3rd (anchor) bolt on the bottom front.

I don't think this was all necessary. I don't think the pulley for the air con needed to be removed and with air tools the bolt on the adjusting bracket could be accessed by removing the skid plate below. I also think the 3rd bolt need not have been touched. The bolt had to be welded on the broken piece only because I didn't have time to source the proper part. All things considered, I think 2 and a half hours is a bit extreme to tighten a belt. But hey, it all got done while i was sleeping and was already parked outside my door in the morning when i woke up!

No the pulley did not need to be removed, it has holes in that you can poke through. But as you say all done and working.

thank you for this. i removed the drivers side plate but could not see how to tension the alternator. Will give removing the skid plate a go.

Done! needed to loosen the tension nut then the tightener belt worked just fine! Cheers for the help!

I have just tightened the alternator belts on my SC AWD and hopefully these links to a couple of pics will work.

On mine I loosened the locking bolt first from underneath after removing the plastic underbody cover (12mm socket)

https://i.servimg.com/u/f28/16/48/88/69/sc_alt10.jpg


then through the drivers side wheel arch after removing the rubber cover I tightened the adjusting bolt (10mm socket). I could never see the head of the bolt. You could use a ring or open end spanner for this.

https://i.servimg.com/u/f28/16/48/88/69/sc_alt11.jpg

Don't forget to do up the lock bolt and replace the rubber wheel arch cover and underbody cover afterwards.

Cheers, Dave

why 2 alt belts?

Hi Ruffnut,

Possibly the 80A alternator needs 2 for effective power transmission when fully loaded up. These are probably borderline for actually needing 2 belts. Alternator belts should not be really tight like on a power steering pump or the bearings will die prematurely. I know early alternators were only around 35A or so so only one belt was needed. A bit of extra power is lost driving the extra belt but I like the reliability factor of having 2. At 80A and 14V the alternator would be giving out more than 1kW so the drive input the belts must handle is a little more than this. I don't think a standard SC with all the options operating would draw 80A. Maybe with the Electric Jug, Fridge, front and rear heaters, front & rear AC, 2 cigarette lighters, high beam, hazard lights, fog lights, all interior lamps, stereo flat out, mirrors being adjusted and all moon roofs being operated at the same time as the electric windows and the soft close door . . . it would. Forgot the demister, seat, steering column and wipers, I'm sure there's more!

Cheers,

Dave

thanks for that i was worried that i only replaced one when it disintergrated last month.

I know why there's 2 belts now. When you neglect the belts like I did and go on a road trip you can just keep going after the first belt whips the underside of the passenger seat floor. When I first heard it I checked and it was just holding on and I had no means of cutting the quite shredded belt. Seeing that it would not be likely to foul anything I just kept driving as I was 1000km from home with caravan attached and looking to continue my holiday. This was the point I discovered that the power steering pump is not belt driven, it is gear driven off the engine somewhere. I was checking to see what else might fail and it is good to know the steering will work as long as the engine is going no matter how many belts you throw. I have now purchased a new set of belts. I love my Hiace.