Remove/replace fan belt - what's the trick?

[NDanecker]

I'm doing the remaining half of my Jacobs brake install and having a hard time with the fan belt. I pretty much gave up for the night figuring I'll be fresh in the morning.



Looking at it this pm, how the hell do they expect you get to the tensioner with a 1/2" rachet? And once you do, it seems near to impossible to feed the belt thru all the correct pulley's or are my hands just too damn fat?! Or am I just too tired tonight and this will all make sense to me tomorrow morning.



Is there a trick? Do you loosen and remove the shroud? What gives? :{

 

[NDanecker]

Well the next day turned out much better. Amazing what a little rest will do ya.



The trick that worked well for me was 1) I removed the air filter case for easier access to the belt tensioner and 2) used a clamp to hold the tensioner in the released position while removing the belt.



As for remembering where the new belt goes, I highly suggest making a sketch or confirm that you have the sticker showing the belt arrangement before pulling the old one off. If you do forget and have no diagram, remember that a pulley with grooves gets the inside of the belt while a pulley that is flat gets the back side of the belt. As obvious as this may sound, this rule of thumb is almost all you need to figure out where the belt goes without a diagram.

 

[Task125]

did you buy from Tallys?I know you where not happy with the first price they gave ya. how do you like the brake?