2002 Civic LX. Belt(s) are squealing. Things to note: -The alt and battery were replaced 8 months ago -Both belts were replaced at that time -Since then both belts were replaced again -The a/c fuse is pulled to rule out the compressor When you start the car or drive normally the belts make no noise. When you start to slow down the revs drop to idle speed. Then when you touch the brakes, turn the wheel or do something to cause a load on the system, a belt starts to be noisy. Having the heat or a/c on makes it worse since more of a burden is on the system. This does not happen all the time. 90% of the time it's when the car is still cold. Sat night when it was snowing it was a real pain in the ass. It didn't do it at all today. Belts have been snugged, overtightened slightly and loosened slightly, all of which have no effect on removing the noise. However loosening them caused the noise to occur more often. Anyone else ever run into this issue?
Not familiar with Honda, but does the belt still run on the ac pulley? That pulley MAY be seizing and causing squeal. Dirt sometimes can build up depending on the belt itself causing slipping
Yeah if the a/c has an electronic clutch it would still spin the pulley itself. Is there anyway any of the pulleys are out of line with one another?
I had this issue on the wifes 02 Civic. Any time I turned on the defrost or turned on the AC it would squeal. I could stop the squealing by turning off the AC or defrost. Replaced the alternator. Still had the squeal. Did the belt. Still had the squeal, replaced the battery, no more squeal.
The a/c was disconnected so that the clutch would not engage and cause a load on the system. The belt was squealing all the time when the a/c was on (comes on automatically when the defrost is turned on). We thought it might be the a/c compressor so we unplugged the fuse. To test the battery it was drained by leaving the headlights on for an extended period of time. The belts were not effected by this. The battery is less then a year old so I would hope it's not the cause.
Just have it tested. In my case it was the original battery. Yeah, you can disable that AC on when set to defrost eh. I did that first as a temp fix.
continuous squealing could be a tensioner or idler pulley with a bad bearing, or even crap in the grooves on the pulleys. Our Ranger at work, 3.0, new pulleys and belt fixed an annoying belt noise problem. One of the grooved pulleys was full of crap.
There is no tensioner As stated before, we've messed around with various tensions on the belts with no success
I can't complain too much though. The car has been good to me. If it was my VW the altenator would have rusted off and the belts would be laying on the 101 somewhere
And we have a winnar!!! Due to cancelled appointments due to weather and a bit of laziness I finally got the car into the garage again yesterday. Sure enough, the battery is not up to the task. Does Costco still sell the optimums?
