Serpentine Belt

docsouce wrote:
To Gdetrailer. Yeah that's exactly what I'm going to do. I appreciate your advise. I'll post what I find. If anything.

I’ve dribbled small amount of water onto a chirping belt before. If it gets quieter, it’s the belt or alignment.

I find it really odd to need an idler at such low miles.

Gates or Dayco. Save the old one as an emergency backup.

To Gdetrailer. Yeah that's exactly what I'm going to do. I appreciate your advise. I'll post what I find. If anything.

docsouce wrote:
Well I did the old "2 foot length of heaterhose trick" (put one end near your ear and the other near the suspected noise culprit" acts like a stethoscope ya know) and it sounded like the idler was chirping. Now that you mentioned it I think I'll change out the belt and see what happens. I don't have an extra one and I should carry one especially when most of our trips end up in the middle of nowhere (by choice).

Not a "reliable" way of finding this type of noise.

There are a lot of internal moving parts just under those idlers, V8 and V10 Triton motors share similar design with the overhead cam system. You have cam chain tensioners and guides right under the idlers and any noise made there can easily be transferred to the outside..

Remove the belt and give the idler a spin by hand, should be smooth and make no noise. Smooth and no noise and most likely the pulley bearings are good (bearings are sealed and moisture shouldn't be able to damage them). While the belt is off spin the alternator, PS pump and A/C pulleys and verify they run smooth.

As someone else noted, alignment off the pulleys can also affect the belt which could cause chirping, however, if it hasn't done this from day one I can't see how the idlers may have come out of alignment.

In your case I suspect that the belt just might be the culprit from the shear amount time that MHs tend to sit around and not being driven.

Fair chance that there is nothing wrong with idlers OR belt and the chirping is from lack of use and pretty much just an annoyance. If that is the case, changing the belt is the easiest and lowest cost to find out.

You can learn a lot about belts reading this webpage:
https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/dayco-qa/

Jay Swope, Principle Engineer of Belt Development wrote:

What causes belt noise?

There are two main causes of belt noise: pulley misalignment causing an intermittent belt noise called “chirp” and low belt tension causing a continuous belt noise called “squeal”. For a much more thorough explanation of belt noises, their causes and solutions, please go to Dayco Drive Belt Training PDF.

Well I did the old "2 foot length of heaterhose trick" (put one end near your ear and the other near the suspected noise culprit" acts like a stethoscope ya know) and it sounded like the idler was chirping. Now that you mentioned it I think I'll change out the belt and see what happens. I don't have an extra one and I should carry one especially when most of our trips end up in the middle of nowhere (by choice).

All these people recommending Goodyear Gatorback belts...Goodyear sold off their belt business in 2015, to Continental.
Any of the good name brands will hold up fine. I prefer Gates or Bando. Dayco and Continental are fine also.
Any of the major brands will be made of EPDM, which is the preferred material. Some of the cheap no name belts are not epdm and will crack and break down much faster.

I use the Gates belt. It's a good idea to also change out the tensioner when you get a new belt. There is a cheap little plastic tool that will give you an indicator of the wear on a serpentine belt. You really can't tell by looking. Carry a spare for cheap insurance. One of our members broke a belt on startup when an unfortunate squirrel got caught in it.

Dusty R wrote:
Many years ago when my first Ford that had a serpentine belt was starting to get cracks in it, I asked the mechanic that I had gotten to know and trust, said that Ford had told them not to worry about those belts until they started loosing rubber.

Dusty

X2!

Had a 2003 F250 that went up to 223,000 miles with the ORIGINAL serp belt.

The ONLY reason it was replaced was one of the idle pulley bearings went bad and was screeching continually..

43K miles is nothing for those idlers, are you REALLY sure it is the idler and not just the BELT causing the chirp? Belts sometimes will chirp just for no good reason.