Aux belt snapped - ideas why?

[Rob669]

I had a new aux belt fitted about a week or so ago and yesterday it broke. I lost power steering and the waterpump - so the engine got a little hot.

All the pumps and pulleys driven by the aux belt feel and look perfectly fine (the water pump, power steering pump, alternator and aircon), there's a tiny bit of damage on the alternator pulley but it looks like old damage so I can't figure out why it broke. It's a ph 1 172 BTW.

Any ideas?

Could just have been a badly made belt I suppose. Anyone else had a similar problem?

 

[mini-valver]

The cambelt did'nt come off???

 

[JR]

speak the alex mate

 

[zack40]

thats bad just make sure it didnt do any damage to the cam belt too..

 

[Rob669]

Cam belt was ok, luckily the auxillary belt broke cleanly and didn't wrap itself around anything important (phew!). I had had the cam belt and aux belt changed together, but the aux belt broke. It's really odd.

 

[mini-valver]

Lucky b*****d! Take it back to whoever put it on mate, could have been too tight and a dodgy belt....

 

[Rob669]

Lucky b*****d! Take it back to whoever put it on mate, could have been too tight and a dodgy belt....

Exactly. The company who fitted it have replaced it. Hopefully it was a dodgy belt!

 

[mini-valver]

If it's snapped clean in half then I wouldn't have thought it can have been fitted wrong, usually it'd just get thrown off....

 

[sideways danny]

maybe they struggled to fit it and used something to lever the belt on which did some damage to the belt?

 

[Rob669]

The belt split, lengthways - along the length of the belt and then it broke in two. Is it possible that something can damage a belt from underneath - flicked up from the road?
I have had a bottom hose punctured before when I drove over a big stick - not a Clio though, but same principle.

 

[mini-valver]

It split down the middle? Is there not a ridge on any of the pulleys? Or a shard of metal stuck to one of them?

 

[Rob669]

Pulleys look normal. That's why I'm thinking dodgy belt or even maybe something from off the road caught it.

 

[mini-valver]

Undertray would stop anything in the road though! Just keep your eye on the condition of the new one. Have a look at it with the engine running to make sure it's running straight and true.....

 

[Rob669]

Tar, will do.

The undertray doesn't protect that area very much though.

 

[Mike@Rentech]

stone damage seen it happen a few times ,no signs of anything wrong with any pulleys yet once new belt is fitted it does not happen again

 

[jablitt]

i'd take it back to the garage that did the work tbh.

 

[Day]

He has.

One of those expensive renault belts too I bet Rob.

 

[mattjk]

Did I just post in here or am i forgetting stuff

 

[Rob669]

stone damage seen it happen a few times ,no signs of anything wrong with any pulleys yet once new belt is fitted it does not happen again

That's a relief. So far it's ok. Nothing broke when I pushed it hard to avoid the humiliation of being caught by a BMW Z3 (I let him win when we hit silly speed ).

The garage who fitted it were great about it.

 

[Rob669]

Something has impacted quite hard on the water pump pulley, there was a small crater on the surface. Could of been a stone or such like I suppose. A piece of wet and dry paper and some rrubbing has taken off the slight rough edges. Feels smooth again. I wonder why that pulley isn't ridged though like the others?

 

[mattjk]

Its not meant to be ridged because it runs off the back of the belt.

Did you find out what the cause was at all?

 

[Rob669]

Yep, that'll be why it isn't ridged then. I reckon that something like a bolt or stone probably hit the aux belt and it probably came up from the road. This made the dent on the water pump pulley, and caused the belt to slip off and then rip apart as it caught on one of the other pulleys. That's my best guess.