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Old 02-12-2010, 02:12 AM   #1
fmicle
 
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Drives: 2007 Yaris LB
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: San Jose, CA, USA
Posts: 685
Belt Tensioner for the Yaris

After loosening the alternator a few times, to replace the pulleys, I had a feeling that I hadn't tighten the belt as much as I should have. Sometimes, when I start the engine, I hear a very short (a fraction of a second) squeak coming from the belt, so I knew I had to tighten the belt more. So far I haven't figured out a better way than sticking a wooden mallot between the engine block and the alternator and use it as a lever to push the alternator away from the engine as much as I can - without damaging anything, and then tighten the bolts.

One day, I was checking my wife's Scion xD engine bay and noticed the wonderful belt tensioner that the xD has, which gives perfect control over the belt tension:



With help from CTScott and some research on my own I got the part numbers down and ordered them. Around $25 altogether. They arrived today, so after I got home I got to work... It ended up being a little more work than I had anticipated, but all in all, it took me a little under 2 hours, including a trip to OSH to get a hack saw.

Please remember to disconnect the negative battery terminal, since you'll be working very close to the alternator, touching metal pieces, tools, etc. I blew one of my main fuses last time I got close to the alternator...

I ended up getting the entire Scion xD belt tensioner assembly for this project which turned out to be a little more parts than I really needed, as described in the picture below. The Scion xD bolt and washer on the left is exactly the same as the one on the Yaris, so I ended up reusing mine. The other bolt on the right is the attachment bolt of the bracket to the xD engine. The Yaris has a bolt sticking out of the engine already so the bracket slides onto that existing bolt and is fastened with a nut.

So you basically only need these three parts listed below:



This is how the complete assembly looks on the xD:



Unfortunately, the engine attachment point is on one side of the bracket on the xD and on the other side on the Yaris. So that square nut that's welded/glued to the bottom of the bracket needs to go... I thought it was going to be easy, just whack it hard with the hammer and it will fly away. I was wrong... I put a dent in the nut, but it didn't budge. So I went to OSH got myself a hack saw and sawed the tiny welds off until the nut came off.



You will also notice that the Yaris bracket is much smaller at the engine attachment point than the xD one. In fact, when I tried to get the xD bracket to slide onto the engine bolt, it just wouldn't fit. Some cutting and polishing was required. Since I already had the hack saw I went to work... I cut that entire lip on the bottom right side of the bracket and then filed around the hole to make it look as close as possible to the Yaris OEM one. The result:



As you can see below, there isn't much spare in there:



And taa-daa, the final result:



Started her up to make sure I can go to work tomorrow and everything worked fine. I'm sure there will be no more squeaking when starting any more
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