Water Pump noises?

[Wayne Dohnal]

I just did the timing belt on my I5 and I just hate the "tension is correct
when you can just twist the belt 90 degrees...." instructions.  It doesn't
say how hard to push with your fingers when you do the test!  I had the
tensioner cranked way tight with a wrench and could still twist the belt
more than 90 degrees.  Then I thought maybe I was pushing too hard and
backed off on the tension some.  At best what I ended up with was an
educated guess, and I'm still having nightmares that maybe it's too tight,
or then again, maybe it's too loose.  I figure that the tension must have a
wide range that is OK since there are thousands of people out there
interpreting very imprecise instructions.

I recently did the timing belt on my Plymouth Voyager.  They have a spring
pulling the tensioner.  The instructions are to put on the belt, then
tighten down the tensioner at the point where the spring has pulled it too.
No guesswork, and no nightmares if I did it right or not.

Wayne Dohnal
1994 S4


>I have been down the water pump noise road recently, and found that the
wrong
>belt  tension will produce 2 types of noise. Too tight will give the
"turkey
>gobble" noise, and way too tight will give a whine as you describe.
>I had the turkey noise but having done the belt myself, I was convinced it
>wasn't that tight. I gradually increased the tension a little at a time
>hoping to cure the noise. It got worse until it finally just whined. I then
>gradually loosened it and the noise finally disappeared.
>Gradually is a _very_ important term here.