# Replaced water pump, radiator, belts, and belts still screaming. wtf?!



## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

As it says, I recently replaced my water pump and radiator, in that order. It all started back when i noticed i was losing coolant very quickly over a period of about a week. I discovered that it was actually 2 hairline fractures in the driver's side of the plastic side tank on the radiator. Specifically, it was the inside seams of the fan mount clips. I made the HUUUUUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE mistake of putting stop-leak in it (For those of you who've never done this, DON'T.), and then it went into the body shop for cosmetic repairs for 2 weeks. Needless to say, the car wasn't running very good when she came out (But damn, she sure did look pretty). The belts were screaming horribly to the point of causing a headache. I was able to drive the car short distances for a while, which is what I needed at the time (GTO was my only driver). Then, my water pump had taken a crap on me, as indicated by pouring water into the reservoir and watching it pour right back out at the pump. So, i flushed the system once with straight water and put the new pump in, which fixed my big leak, but not my squeeling belts problem. Ok, crap. So eventually I got my hands on a new radiator (Unfortunately, I couldn't find an all-aluminum here in Hawaii, and couldn't find any sites that ship them here). I bought some more dexcool, prestone super flush, a new water pump belt, bottled water, and a monster energy drink to get this done. So, step one was flushing the system. Ok, cool, done. Removing the old radiator was a bit of a pain, since some of the hose clamps were facing in the worst directions possible, preventing me from loosening them unless I undid something else completely unrelated, but otherwise it was a fairly easy process. I also made sure to put the new belt in as well. Put everything back together, fill the coolant properly, ran it for 20 minutes, and TA-DA! My coolant system is officially fixed! .... Kinda. The belts are screaming. STILL. And it's driving me and all my neighbors nuts because now I have no clue what it is, if it's not the water pump, and it's not the belt itself. All the pulleys seem to function properly, as well. What the hell is going on with my car?


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## alaninin (Dec 4, 2010)

Have you checked the belt tensioner? I would also check if everything is spinning freely by hand with the belt removed. Wish you the best with fixing your belts. You might want to remove the AC belt just to eliminate the ac drive.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

alaninin said:


> Have you checked the belt tensioner? I would also check if everything is spinning freely by hand with the belt removed. Wish you the best with fixing your belts. You might want to remove the AC belt just to eliminate the ac drive.


The belt tensioner and everything else in that line work fine from what I can tell. Maybe the belts are screaming because the tensioner isn't tightening everything up like it's supposed to? I Didn't want to spin that bolt counter-clockwise when putting the belt back on the tensioner out of fear that i'd have a bolt sitting in my skid plate and a pulley laying somewhere under or around the car.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

Self-bumping this. I've checked over every pulley in the accessory line, and none of them seem to be out of their normal functioning. The belt is brand new. The water pump is brand new. Hell, I even bought a new tensioner pulley to throw in tomorrow if need be the case. Nothing seems out of alignment...

I work on multi-million dollar helicopters for the US Army, but I can't figure out a squealing belt in my $11k car. Go figure.


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## 87GN06GTO07IRL (Aug 10, 2009)

Ehrgeiz X said:


> Hell, I even bought a new tensioner pulley to throw in tomorrow if need be the case.


Try a complete tensioner assembly not just the pulley.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

87GN06GTO07IRL said:


> Try a complete tensioner assembly not just the pulley.


Great. Of course, the assembly would be $70-$100 here. I'm gonna have to wait on that one... Now, everything on the car runs fine, it's just the damn squeal that's driving me crazy. would water and dexcool antifreeze cause this crap if it got on the belts?


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## alaninin (Dec 4, 2010)

Which Island you on? I will be there in Feb for work. I have not seen any GTO's on the Island my last visits. If you need anything from the main land let me know. I will be at Pearl Harbor.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

alaninin said:


> Which Island you on? I will be there in Feb for work. I have not seen any GTO's on the Island my last visits. If you need anything from the main land let me know. I will be at Pearl Harbor.


Pearl harbor? That's great, actually. I stay on Schofield! :willy:

However, I'll be in recovery for a surgery on my right ear during febuary, so it's iffy on if i'll be able to make or not. As far as parts go, i'm not really sure what I need other than new brake pads (possibly rotors and calipers, though i'm not concerned about that right now), and maybe a new tensioner to mount up on my water pump. I check back on this thread daily though, so I'll be sure to keep you informed as well. Hopefully i'm well enough to get you around an island goat again!:cheers


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## alaninin (Dec 4, 2010)

I can get a belt tensioner here for $45 if you need one let me know. It would be the end of Feb. when I will be there. It looks like the 27th. Save some money but would have to wait a month to get it.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

alaninin said:


> I can get a belt tensioner here for $45 if you need one let me know. It would be the end of Feb. when I will be there. It looks like the 27th. Save some money but would have to wait a month to get it.


Good stuff. I'll be sure to tuck away that $45!


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## fattirewilly (May 26, 2006)

Ehrgeiz X said:


> would water and dexcool antifreeze cause this crap if it got on the belts?


YES it would cause squealing. My water pump took a crap on me during a trip and the car was flat bedded 50 miles to the nearest dealer. Anti freeze all over the front of the engine. They had to put on a new S belt to stop the squeal. They weren't hosing me because my new S belt happened to be the one in the trunk I just happened to have.

Thanks for your service!!!


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## Rukee (Feb 8, 2007)

Before replacing the belt I would hose the pullies with some brake and parts cleaner to clean them off and not contaminate the new belt. Cover the fenders so the cleaner isn't slung on them while cleaning.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

I see. That would explain a good bit, since several friends have also made the conclusion it could be the under drive belt. The tensioner is located just below the ACC belt tensioner, isn't it? I'll be putting a new ACC tensioner on as well, just to be safe. I can replace the S belt and clean everything while I'm at that. I would hope a general degreaser should work out, since I've got plenty of that from cleaning my floors at my old place. On a side note, after I finally fix this, I'd like to make a separate thread with the issue and the fix, since I've seen alot of old threads like this that never had resolution. That way, people can reference a sticky instead of having to try all this and keep checking back for answers, haha:lol:


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## SRT LOL (Dec 1, 2011)

How about we Isolate the concern. While is running. spray wd-40 on both ends of the belt away from other pulleys. If that doesnt quiet it down, shut the car off. Inspect the power steering pulley. the pulley and the snout of the pump should be flush. If that looks okay, start the car and turn on the AC. Listen for a tone change or an absence of squeak. Spray the AC belt with WD-40... keep us posted.


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## Rukee (Feb 8, 2007)

I would not spray any lubricant onto the belts.


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## Red Bearded Goat (Mar 19, 2007)

Don't waste your time with cleaning products or lubricants around the belts or rotating components which all have sealed bearings. 

The way I determined which belt drive system was making noise on my GTO..

1) Remove both belts. Fire the engine up briefly to confirm the sound is gone and had come from either belt drive system.
2) Reinstall the aux belt, leaving the ac belt off and fire the engine up. Squeal goes away, its in the AC drive.
3) If the squeal is still there, remove the aux drive belt and reinstall only the AC belt. Fire up the engine to confirm its gone or coming from both belt drive systems.
4) Which ever one or both, that you find making the squealing sound, replace the belt, tensioner and idler pulley.

After 3 years of quiet operation, 2 years ago mine started to squeal each year after the summer heat subsided and fall temps set in. Figuring the belt expanded beyond the ability of the tensioner to maintain proper tension, i replaced the belt each year and the squeal went away. But after only putting about 6000 miles on new belts twice and they started to squeal again, I want a cure that last longer. 

Following the above I found the sound was coming from my AC belt drive and opted to replace both belts, tensioners and idler pulleys... No its not a cheap fix and I hope to find this approach has worked next fall because I believe its the best way to cure the problem.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

Rukee said:


> I would not spray any lubricant onto the belts.


I carefully applied belt conditioner to both belts, but nothing changed. On an unrelated note, I've noticed a slight kick in the steering wheel at 20-30mph. My guess is a flat spotted tire from sitting in one spot too long. Oh well, front tires are due for replacement anyways and I was going to get the alignment checked regardless.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

Red Bearded Goat said:


> Don't waste your time with cleaning products or lubricants around the belts or rotating components which all have sealed bearings.
> 
> The way I determined which belt drive system was making noise on my GTO..
> 
> ...


Thanks for all this! I'll give this a shot and see what happens. I'm willing to bet the ACC belt tension might have gone. I still need to try that new pulley, but when alininin gets here to Hawaii, I'm just gonna replace the whole tensioner anyways.


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## 97ramsst (Jul 27, 2011)

We have had roughly 135 LSX powered cars and the AC belt or AC tensionor is the cause of the squeeling 95% of the time. When you change the belts go with Goodyear Gatorbacks...the cheaper ones are junk and will squeal worse.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

Well, I've dug out my tool set from my closet as well as my tensioner pulley, so when the sun rises I'm gonna go ahead and change it out. Is there any trick to getting the bolt out of th e pulley or does it just come out like any other bolt?


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

Oh, and I managed to find some pictures as to where my radiator was leaking from, if it counts for anything.

Here's when me and a buddy removed the front bumper and started to run it and somewhat flush the system with a garden hose once it was off. Seeing the crack while it was running helped because of the pressure pushing the cracks out, as well as causing the leaking to be more severe with throttle play. Here's where we noticed the coolant was dripping from at first...








And here's where the crack was. Obviously, the flat head is pointing to it. This was on the inside of the radiator, the fan mounts. It's pretty obscure when everything is installed, so if you ever run into a problem where coolant is all over your engine bay, and it only slowly leaks over time and you have no idea what to check, just go ahead and remove your fans and start looking in those spots, since they seem to be the most common (due to those plastic side tanks being CRAP!)









This issue, as stated, was fixed with a new radiator. DO NOT EVEEEEERRRRRR rely on stop leak with these cars. You're liable to destroy just about everything else, as i've found through some hard learning and research. The water pump wouldn't have been such a painful blow if it weren't for the $220 pricetag, but installation is fairly easy with some dexterity in the hands and wrists and an extra pair from a friend who can pretty much just stand there for moral support. You don't really have to remove the radiator, but if you don't, be careful since you'll be moving the water pump around so close to the radiator and one wrong move can cause the pulley and radiator to have a very unpleasant date.


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

WHOO! Isolated my problem a bit more. I tried the trick with taking off each belt and running the car both times and whatnot, and it seems it's the air conditioner belt. For now i've taken it off and left it off since I haven't mustered the care to try to finangle that crap back in with a new belt yet, but I seem to have found my problem. My question is... Is it ok to drive the car without the smaller belt on? I should only be losing my air conditioning, right?


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## Ehrgeiz X (Apr 10, 2011)

So, just finished replacing the air conditioner belt, and that fixed it! I feel silly knowing that it was really something simple the whole time. Still, it was a bit of a pain to get back in. I dropped my wrench into the skid plate >.<


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## mikeb131 (Nov 20, 2009)

I just had a problem with my 2004 gto with 85k miles.. I had a squeeling noise and thought it was a belt or water pump. My mechanic actually said it was the A/c compressor. He took the belt off of the a/c compressor (its winter here in NY - so not a big deal) and the noise was gone. Not sure if this was your issue but might be worth checking


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## HP11 (Apr 11, 2009)

Read his post again....he fixed it. Maybe all you need is a new belt also.....


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## Red Bearded Goat (Mar 19, 2007)

hp11 said:


> read his post again....he fixed it. Maybe all you need is a new belt also.....


+1...


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