Belt Changes

[stardalo]

I am getting all the belts, hoses and coolant changed on my 2003 Winneabgo Journey DL with a Cat 3126 and Allison 3000. Rig is now 10 years and I have never done it. All looks great and I am not having any issues, but I figure better to do this all now before I have an issue on the side of the road. I see gates makes these new green heavy duty belts. Anyone ever use them? Should I go with those over the regular belts?

[wolfe10]

And, at 10 years old, while replacing the hoses, replace the thermostats (Caterpillar calls them regulators) and check the serpentine belt tensioner.

Here is a Gates Corp video on checking the belt tensioner-- they can fail in three ways: bearings, spring, dampening: http://www.gates.com/tensioner/tensioner_video.html

[bsinmich]

I did all of the above on my 2003 Workhorse also. The mechanic said the belt was in very poor shape and replaced that but when he got to the hoses he said they were not showing signs of aging and should give no problem. He replaced the thermostat, flushed the cooling system and replaced the Dexcool. On a 450 mile trip last week it worked great but didn't give the cooling system much of a workout because we never needed the AC. We did get to check out the furnace a couple of mornings when it got under 50F.

[path1]

Before I went thru our old and used Majestic(gas)and Class C, I called an old friend (that is not retired yet) from a large trucking company and in charge of fleet maint of many, many units. Told him what I was up to and doing and didn't want to break down over a $10.00 part somewhere. Nothing but praise for gates belts, but he said not to by the strongest heavy duty one out there. He said premature failures does happen sometimes(with all belts)and the super strong heavy duty belts are so strong they don't "break clean" and sometimes get caught on different pully's or even scrape up or damage the front seal(somehow). Or when the mechanics put on the new belt they sometimes don't always check for old belt fibers or pieces that might have got caught in different places and those pieces could take out other parts as if they are rubbing againist other moving parts. He recommend "green stripe fleet guard".
And for coolant hoses he couldn't say enough good things about "green stripe 2" hoses. I looked them up and here is info on them from a fleet management point of view. Of course it is from Gates, so they aren't going to say anything bad about them. http://www.gates.com/file_display_common.cfm?thispath=Gates%2Fdocuments%5Fmodule&file=Gates%20Fleet%...
Just for good measure on ours, I also replaced belt tensioner and idler pulley and water pump. But that is on a small gas motor. Don't know what the expected service life is on hi-torque low rpm stuff is.
OK thought I'd pass along info I got from a fleet manager that I've known for many years. (Always carry extra filters, belts and credit card):B

[wolfe10]

Yes, I use Gates Green Stripe Belts and hoses. Too much work to change them to not use one of the best.

[stardalo]

Born To Travel wrote:
When I changed mine over the winter, I went to the local auto parts store and asked for the best belts they sell.. They gave me those.. Make shure you save the old belts and put them in a compartment in case you break one on the road..

I'm pretty paranoid so I already carry a vacuum packed brand new gates spare. But I will keep the old one anyways.

[Born_To_Travel]

When I changed mine over the winter, I went to the local auto parts store and asked for the best belts they sell.. They gave me those.. Make shure you save the old belts and put them in a compartment in case you break one on the road..

[stardalo]

Lol. Regular belt lasted 10 years and looks absolutely perfect after 70,000 miles. I just figure statistically, its time is more likely up than a new one.

[What_Next]

Regular belt lasted 10 years , good enough for me. But then what's a couple of bucks more if it will make you feel better.