mojoman

The other day I was driving about 70mph when I heard a mild boom and all of my dash lights went on. The car drove fine but overheated so I stop and had it towed. Turns out that the fan belt broke.

I have replaced the belt but the tentioner doesn't tighten. The bolt that I understand tightens the tentioner just turns and does nothing.

Do you think the tensioner is fried? If so, how hard is it to change and does anybody have any instructions?

Thanks

mojoman

Thanks anyway. Well I fixed the problem without any help from this forum.

I found detailed instructions on another site.
Seems the tension rod broke because some fool didn't tighten the tensioner (I guess). In any case, the tension rod was around $18.00 plus shipping so it wasn't that bad. I took time to replace the water pump, tensioner, dampener & rod, plus do a complete tune-up.

Anybody thinking about doing this job should know that it's pretty involved and I give it a 5 out of 10 on the difficult scale.

I plan on running a can of SeaFoam next. 1/3 down the throdle body, 1/3 in the tank and once I've burned all of the gas... finally 1/3 in the crankcase for 50 miles then change the oil. I did this on my 96 Mercury Grand Marquis V8 and the car runs like new. Did it on my Lexus LS400 with the same results. Incredible stuff.

hineywineries

I'm glad to hear you got your problem solved, but I must admit you peaked my curiousity. What made you think that you could keep driving when all the lights on your dash came on?

GEDaggett

That is a one way ticket to blownheadgasketville.