How To Replace Serpentine Belt Idler Pulleys 2005-09 Chevy Equinox

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In this video, I'm going to show you how to replace two of the idler pulleys on this 2008 Equinox with a 3.4-liter, same as a Torrent with the 3.4-liter. Replacing the idler pulley is actually quite easy, but you do have to remove the air box and a couple of other things to make it easy to get there. Tools you'll need are a flat blade screwdriver, 10mm, 15mm, and 18mm socket with ratchets and extensions, a 3/8 drive ratchet or flex handle.

To get to it, you have to remove the intake tube. Not too difficult, there's a plug here, you just take a little tab, move it to the side, and pull that off. Then there's two clamps to loosen. I'm going to speed this up a little bit. What I found, actually, is you only need to loosen up the clamp that's on the engine side or closer to the engine, and then you pull the tube off the engine. Actually, that's good enough. Now there's a couple of clips, you just pull off with your thumbs and you can lift this up. To get to your air box up and off, there's a little safety clamp here that you'll want to remove carefully. Then you can disconnect this harness and pull this right out. 10mm bolt right back here, remove that. You probably take your air cleaner out. Now your air box will come right up, pull it back and out. There is a harness right here, just pull that up and out and take your air box out.

You'll want to put a jack right underneath the engine. With your air box out of the way, you want to remove your engine mount, and that's why you're supporting the vehicle with a jack. It's 18mm nuts on the outside, and then 15mm bolts on the engine side. Remove those two nuts then, jack the engine up a little bit, remove the 15mm bolts, and then you can remove, you'll see me remove the mount. In this next part, it's a little difficult to see what I'm doing, so I drew an arrow. The arrow points to your belt tensioner, and you can see down at the bottom, if you're looking at it in good enough resolution, that the tensioner has a small 3/8 square hole in it so you take a 3/8 drive flex handle. If you jack up the engine enough, you probably get a regular ratchet handle on there. You put it into that square hole, and you'll see what you do with it.

Now here's your tensioner, and you're going to need a flexible handle like this. Basically, you just want to put the handle in, flex that into the tensioner, and push it in. Then you can pull up on your handle, let the tension off the belt, take the belt off, and slowly let your handle back down and out. In this shot, you'll notice the belt is gone. To replace any of the idler pulleys, you really don't have to remove your belt all the way, you can just loosen it, and then take the idler pulleys off and back on. If you do remove it, I do have a diagram later in the video that shows you how to get it back on. There are two of these smooth style idler pulleys, one's right on top, nice and easy, 15mm socket and ratchet. Remove the bolt, just take note of how it's installed. Make sure you install the new one the exact same way.

To reinstall, tighten the bolt to about 30 to 35 foot-pounds, don't over tighten it. There's another smooth idler pulley right down here, put a 15mm wrench on it and I'm just going to put it on like that. What I suggest, take another wrench, hook right into your 15mm, that will give you some extra leverage to loosen up that bolt. I'm going to fast-forward here. Once you get it loosened up, it's just a matter of reaching down in there and getting the bolt off. No real, great, easy way to do it, you just got to keep working the wrench, it's a tight close quarter. Again, once you get it off, take note of how it's installed, make sure you install your new one the same way. Use the same trick to tighten it.

Next up we're going to put the belt back on. I am going to pick it up just from having the belt preliminarily routed. Here is a diagram to help you route it if you either took your belt off or if it fell off a couple of pulleys and you weren't sure how to get it back on. Put your bar in and pull up on your tensioner. Put your belt down onto this idler pulley, make sure it's on the alternator well enough. Let your tensioner go. With your engine jacked up high enough, you can get that right out. Now put your mount back on and start the bolts. You can let your engine down some. Make sure you get the bolts started first. Speed it up here some. I'll start those bolts in, just make sure the jack is positioned so that the engine is just barely lifting up on that mount and preliminarily tighten those bolts. Those are 15mm bolts. Then let the engine down some and put on the 18mm nuts. Then preliminarily tighten them. Then I'm going to tighten the 18mm nuts to 85 foot-pounds and then I'm going to tighten the 15mm bolts to 45 foot-pounds.I

I'm going to put my air box back down in and my wiring harnesses go up above. Now there are two rubber plugs that go in the holes in the front. Guide them in place, push them forward. Tighten up that bolt nice and firm, and then make sure you put the pin for the wiring harness back in place. Put the air cleaner back in, make sure it's seated correctly. It does have a little tab here so make sure it goes in the right way. Put the hose in first and make sure the harnesses doesn't get in your way, Down in place, put that back on, clip that back on, pop that one back on, and make sure that's all back and tighten up the clamps. Be sure to reconnect that hose and that right there. This little lock inserts from the back like that.

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How To Replace Serpentine Belt Idler Pulleys 2005-09 Chevy Equinox

step 1 :Disconnecting the Air Intake

step 2 :Removing the Engine Mount

step 3 :Removing the Serpentine Belt

step 4 :Removing the Idler Pulley

step 5 :Installing the Idler Pulley

step 6 :Reinstalling the Serpentine Belt

step 7 :Reinstalling the Engine Mount

step 8 :Reinstalling the Air Intake

Tools needed

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Part Details:

How to Replace Idler Pulley 2005-10 Chrysler 300

How To Replace Serpentine Belt Idler Pulleys 2005-09 Chevy Equinox

step 1 :Disconnecting the Air Intake 0:45

step 2 :Removing the Engine Mount 2:40

step 3 :Removing the Serpentine Belt 3:32

step 4 :Removing the Idler Pulley 5:10

step 5 :Installing the Idler Pulley 5:20

step 6 :Reinstalling the Serpentine Belt 6:39

step 7 :Reinstalling the Engine Mount 7:40

step 8 :Reinstalling the Air Intake 9:00

Tools needed

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Dodge Chrysler 3 Piece Serpentine Drive Belt Component Kit TRQ BPA05101

Part Details:

How to Replace Idler Pulley 2005-10 Chrysler 300

step 1 :Disconnecting the Air Intake

step 2 :Removing the Engine Mount

step 3 :Removing the Serpentine Belt

step 4 :Removing the Idler Pulley

step 5 :Installing the Idler Pulley

step 6 :Reinstalling the Serpentine Belt

step 7 :Reinstalling the Engine Mount

step 8 :Reinstalling the Air Intake