I was driving the other day--- I see smoke coming from my hood... I immediately pull over. Pop the hood. My serpentine belt is hanging off.

I get it towed to my house--- I buy a new belt...

And just now I put it on--- was real easy, took me 2 minutes... I doublechecked everything.

I start it and everything seems to be working great... but then after 30 seconds, it starts smoking... I look at it and the rubber is melted to the tensioner...

I have no idea, why it did this to the old belt and now to the brand new one, too?

What does this mean? Is it a bad tensioner... and/or is one of my pulleys damaged?

Help... I'm stranded here with no car...

 

One of the items driven by the belt is probably damaged. Try turning the pulleys by hand, if good the pulleys should turn with little drag. Be nice to know what engine & year.

 

I've see the A/C compressor lock up and do that... like Pete said, check each component.

 

i would suspect the a/c compressor too. especially since it happens about the time the a/c would kick on after a start.

 

I purchased (2) new tensioners and another new belt...

I manually tried turning the pulleys by hand... they turn relatively easily...

So, I took off the old (2) tensioners and put new ones on. And I put the new belt on now, too...

I ran the engine for a few seconds the first time, the belt slid off the top tensioner a little bit... so, I killed the engine... and put the belt back on again and double-checked everything was aligned...

I just ran it for 10 seconds... it seems to be making some sort of weird noise (which I can't pinpoint the location.) Anyways, before I put the new tensioners on, I blew a new belt... So, I want to be real careful this time so I don't blow another brand new belt ($25)

Any advice/ideas/tricks/tips or warning signs?

Thanks...

(I just want to be sure before I run it for longer than 10 seconds, that it's not going to melt the belt again or anything else...) For all I know, with the new tensioners I just put on plus the new belt, everything will be fine... but something just doesn't seem right?

 

Try turning the AC on & off and see what happens when the compressor clutch engages and tries to turn the compressor. The AC pulley will free wheel unless the clutch engages

 

Make sure the belt looks aligned on all the pulleys -- if a pulley was not put back on all the way, a pulley could be maligned causing issues. Sometimes the alternator bearing can go out if there was a bad tensioner for some time...

 

that would be the only thing i could think, is that a pulley is not functioning correctly and the belt is moving faster than the pulley. I did the same thing with a 97 firebird that i used to have. is the tensioner really tight? maybe its not keeping as tight as it should.