Often the cause of unstable operation of the electrical equipment of your car is a failed or poorly tensioned generator belt. Do not immediately rush to a car service center to ask for help in fixing the problem, because replacing the generator belt is not as difficult as it seems at first glance, and most motorists can afford it.
The first sign that the alternator drive belt is unusable or loose is the whistle that appears when you put a strain on the car’s electrical equipment (turn on the headlights, radio, etc.). On many car models, an indicator is provided that gives a signal in case of malfunctions, and then you need to take measures to eliminate them without delay, otherwise this car assembly will fail.
When deciding to inspect the system, you need to take some precautions, including stopping the engine and disconnecting the negative battery cable. Then you need to inspect the belt, located on most car models to the left of the engine, for defects, its tension and sagging. If you find obvious defects (rush, delamination, severe wear), then the alternator belt must be replaced by acquiring a new one. When loosening and sagging, tension the alternator belt.
Replacing an old or damaged belt with a new one is easy. To do this, loosen the nut of the bolt of the tension mechanism of the generator drive with the key, loosen the belt by releasing the tensioner bolt with the key, and remove the loose
worn belt. Try to remember how the worn belt was installed in order to replace the new one in the reverse order.
To simply tighten the alternator belt, use a wrench to turn the tension bolt a few turns, while controlling the tension of the alternator belt. If you have an autotester, then you can use it to adjust the tension more accurately, bringing the indicators to the values specified in the technical documentation for your car.
Consider the tension of the alternator belt using an autotester for the VAZ models 2108, 2109 and 21099. First of all, warm up the engine at idle until stable operation. Then it is necessary to connect the tester to the battery, setting the voltage measurement mode on it, and loosen the tension mechanism of the generator. With insufficient voltage generated by the generator, the indicators on the tester's dial will be
continuously change your testimony. To adjust the voltage, it is necessary to move the generator to tighten the belt with a tensioning bolt (with a mount - depending on the car model) until the position on the tester's dial becomes unchanged, then fix the tensioning bolt with a lock nut and tighten the generator mount.
After the alternator belt has been replaced and tensioned, it is necessary to check the operation of the generator. Why, by connecting the disconnected wire to the battery, start the engine and give a load to the electrical equipment, turn on the heating, radio and high beam headlights and make several engine reboots. The lack of a whistle of the alternator belt and the stable operation of electrical equipment suggests that the work was done efficiently.