[Vwdiesel] alternator belts

[Scott Alexander]

Yesterday, on the way home from work, my car ate an alternator belt. 
Now, in part, it's my fault in that it had been squealing and I'd
figured I could get away with not tightening it for a bit longer since
I'd gotten busy with other things.  (Since I have a/c and power steering
on the car, I'll be paying for that misjudgment.)

Nonetheless, I replaced the alternator belt as part of all the work I
did when I first got the car.  The new belt was chewed up (ie, missing
chunks of rubber) at not much more that 1000 miles.  Figuring that maybe
it was just a crappy belt, we put the original belt back on since it was
handy and didn't show much wear.  It seems that that belt should have
been tightened every 3-4k miles (based on the fact that I tightened once
in the 7-8k miles since I put it back on).  On all the cars I've had
before, tightening the alternator belt wasn't a regular maintenance
item.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Scott Alexander
'82 Rabbit D
-- 
Scott Alexander <salex at dsl.cis.upenn.edu>