Slow Guy

This is a little story about replacing a 993 alternator belt on the side of the road, what parts and tools you’ll need and what NOT to do in the process. Although I’m now on my 3rd air-cooled 911 I’ve never had the need to replace the belts on any of them so this was a new experience for me, and I’m very glad for that experience. Hopefully this write-up will help someone else avoid my mistakes.

Chuck S., David B. and myself were on the “spirited” drive group at Palooza in the Ozarks of NW Arkansas. We had been running the cars pretty hard on some great Porsche driving roads for several hours. David had promised his girlfriend Micki lunch in downtown Eureka Springs and Chuck and I were happy to join them. So, I set my GPS to get us back to Palooza and off we went.

We didn’t make 5 min. when I got a call from Chuck telling me he had heard a bang and every light on the dash of his ’96 993 had lit up and stayed on. He pulled into a back woods general store that was only a little larger than an outhouse and we started troubleshooting the problem.

First off, if I had spent 30 seconds really thinking about the symptoms I would have known right away what the cause was. Instead I had him pop the hood to check the battery and it’s connections, which of course were fine. After that we headed to the engine compartment where we found the cause of the problem, as it was quite obvious. The alternator belt had disintegrated and bits of it were all over the engine compartment with a significant chunk of it now integrated into the A/C clutch assy. Fortunately it didn’t seem to impact the fan belt so engine cooling was not affected.

Chuck was much better prepared for this mishap than I was as he had spares for all 3 belts (I had none). Chuck also had the star tool needed to hold the alternator shaft so you can remove the pulley nut (I didn’t have that either). Only thing was neither of us had a wrench big enough to remove the nut itself. Fortunately David had an adjustable wrench that worked fine. David also had a ratchet and 13mm deep socket that made loosening the A/C compressor much easier.

For some reason we couldn’t get the A/C compressor to slide far enough in to give us the slack needed to remove the belt, even with all 4 mounting bolts and the adjuster bolt fully loose so we just used a long screwdriver and bumped the engine and got the belt off. With 32 to low 60 deg. Temps we weren’t planning to put the A/C belt back on anyhow. Besides, some of those alt. belt bits were NOT coming out of the compressor pulley.

We did have a couple of local boys (one a local Ford dealer mechanic) who stopped and asked if we needed any help. They were very friendly and didn’t give us any grief about our foreign car breaking down, in fact they were quite impressed with our Porsches. They spent a good 5 min. with us talking about Porsches and the Ford GT and then went on their way.

After getting the A/C belt off and getting as many bits of the disintegrated alt. belt we could find it was time to put the new belt on. Here’s where I really screwed up. I got the belt past the engine tin retaining nuts that are strategically placed to make getting the belts under the pulleys as challenging as possible, and got the belt under the pulley. We then went about deciding which side of the pulley half the majority of the shims should go on with a new belt. Unfortunately we discovered the new belt was too long (it really wasn’t but more about that later). Chuck said he got the new belts from the boys at FD Motorsports and we couldn’t believe they sent him the wrong belt. We were using the shortest of the 3 belts they sent but it was still too long. We cussed Mark and Darin (not really but it sounds better for the story) for sending Chuck the wrong belt and decided since the fan belt was fine engine cooling would not be impacted we would try to make it back to Eureka Springs on his battery charge and put the pulley back together without an alt. belt.

With the GPS I was leading us back to Eureka Springs when I spotted a nice NAPA auto parts store that was still open. We pulled in and had them use their cross reference to try and find a belt that was a little shorter that would work. We were on our 2nd try when David noticed I was putting the belt on the outer of the 3 lower pulleys instead of the middle pulley as it should have been. We wondered if I had been doing that the whole time and decided to try the original spare alternator belt from FD Motorsports. Sure enough it fit just like it was made for it! Damn was I embarrassed!

We buttoned everything back up, started the car up and the lights on the dash went out as they should have. Did I say I was embarrassed? We headed back to Eureka Springs, dropped Chuck’s car back at his hotel and the 3 of us met Micki for a nice lunch at a little Italian restaurant in town.

A few things I learned.
1) Obviously I need to start carrying replacement belts in my car. I also need to get the star tool for the Alt. shaft and a wrench to fit the shaft nut. It would also be a good idea to add a ratchet and a few strategic sockets to the toolkit.

2) I have drop lights and flashlights of every sort coming out the kazoo in my garage at home, that also happens to be where my nice 3 LED “head light” is. It would have been much better utilized if that had been in my toolkit in the car for this little adventure. I’d like to think if I had been able to see the lower pulleys a little better I wouldn’t have tried 4 or 5 times to put the belt on the wrong pulley.

3) I learned the pulleys on the end of the Alt. shaft don’t rotate together and they are able to spin individually. This clarifies for me what others have written about in other posts about the Alt.

4) Although we didn’t spend too long chasing our tails in the battery compartment I know if I had spent 30 seconds really thinking about the symptoms I would have headed straight for the fan belts in the first place. That’s a problem for me sometimes, I get so anxious to get working on the problem I don’t take the time to think about what I should be doing. That’s something I need to work on and not just when I’m replacing fan belts.

I hope someone else learns a little from this adventure. Although it was a little chilly and overcast the weather could have been much worse for working on a 993 on the side of the road. And though it took 3 of us to replace 1 alternator belt this time I’m quite confident I’ll be able to do it myself, and much quicker next time.

Edit: Also need to add the info for the 5 mm allen (hex) wrench needed for removing the fan belt pulley (3 allen bolts).

FYI a 15/16" box end wrench also works on the 24mm nut. It's cheaper and easier to find. (one is now in my on-board tool kit).

ilko

I'm glad it all worked out at the end Bill!

I always carry spare belts and a 24mm wrench (I bought one just for that reason) in the front trunk along with a cheap wrench set from Target. Not ideal, but if needed be I can change the belts in less than 30 minutes on the side of the road.

AOW162435

Bill,
Fantastic write-up. It's stories like this that make me yearn for the Clewett setup...


Andreas

EckFe1

Nice story Bill,
I too had that problem this year. I was on the Autobahn from Nuremberg to Munich in Germany. At 150mph +, my ABS light went on. I figured one of the sensors went bad so I stayed in it. App. 5 min. later, the battery charge light went on too. I pulled into the next rest stop and checked the belts.
The alternator belt was in bits and pieces. When it went off, it turned the AC belt upside down. It was now riding with the V on top and not in the groove anymore. I had no replacements with me, just some hand tools. I took a screw driver and pried the belt off. The fan belt was OK.
I forgot to mention that it was Saturday afternoon. No shops are open in Germany. I had another 50 miles to go so I figured I'll take the chance and drive it on battery power. I called AAA to have them meet me at the destination with a new belt. They didn't have what I needed but a Ford belt matched the size best so we tried to install it. Needless to say I didn't have any shims either and since the new belt was shorter we didn't know what to do. The AAA guy then totally surprised me. I took a washer off the guard rail, measured ID/OB and we installed it.
The next day, I drove 120 miles to get back home and it performed just fine.
Guess what I carry with me now...yes, and the guard rail washer too. You'll never know.
The clewett set up is on my Xmas list. I already emailed them but never got a response. I wanted to know how they mount the tensioner since I wanted to understand the system completely before I buy it.
I don't want to shift the belt problem into a tensioner weakness or whatever might be the weak spot with that setup.
The cool thing is that even after 50 miles w/o alternator belt, the car still started just fine. So I assume at least 70 miles w/o lights on or other users would definitely be doable. Might be good to know for somebody in trouble.
Ed

1pcarnut

Good write-up, thanks. I don't like being at the hands of tow guys. Need to get the proper tools in the car for this.

Slow Guy

I found the tool that Chuck had for holding the Alt. shaft (triple-square).

part no. 999-571-052-02

black ice

Thank you, that was a great story.

I had a similar thing happen to me a couple of years ago. On a really dark road at night by myself, it seemed like a good time to air out the car. I reached redline at full throttle in second gear, and heard BAM! then every light on the dashboard lit up. I imagine that's what it would be like in an F15 in a dogfight and getting struck by a missile.

Fortunately I had heard the melee pretty clearly from behind and had a pretty good idea what had happened...

Davies

Yeah the AC compressor is a bitch. Should really come off and be moved out of the way when doing an alt belt change...Which means you run the risk of dropping the nuts into the black abyss of the engine bay, especially if you're doing a change out on the road. The whole 993 belt system is a pretty dopey design.

csertich

I want to thank Bill and David for all the help. You have to realize that Bill had two other sets of eyes as he was installing the belt and we didn't catch the problem either. I was really amazed at Bill's keen sense and intuition as to where to properly place the shims for proper belt tension. There really was very little trial and error on his part on this part of the belt install. My car ran great on the way home.

When the belt appeared not to fit, I was sure that I had told Darin the wrong info about my having the pulley update (which I don't) and that is why I had the 'wrong' belts. But a quick look at Bill's car showed he didn't have the update either and the part number on his alternator belt was the same as the one we were trying to install on my car. We were stumped until David noticed the error of our ways.

Bill is a class act. Thank you again Bill! Excellent write-up.

chuck

s2racer

where can you get that triple square tool?

black ice

I saw a long time ago you could get it from Pelican but they want like $30 - and it's probably only $20 from your stealer.

I just got a K-D tools one and cut the end off and use with a hex box end wrench. $3.

dave

Slow Guy

Yes it's on Pelican, a couple dollars more than it can be had elsewhere though.

Slow Guy

Since I didn't have the triple square Alt. shaft tool or the Tow eye in my 993 toolkit I ordered them from GetPorscheParts.com (Tischer Porsche in MD)

Alt. tool 999.571.052.02 (24.46)
Towing eye 996.721.151.00 (10.31)

FDMotorsports (Mark & Darin) could have gotten it but I didn't want to delay my engine drop parts order. Besides, I've got a few other things to order from them later.
Pelican also carries both parts and would suspect Vertex does too.

I have a nice 4 tool set of triple square sockets in my toolbox but didn't want to break that up to keep 1 in the car. Besides, this tool looks like it's made for the toolkit.

The wrench I'll get locally (I can paint it silver if the mood strikes me).

freeman

Can you tell us what the Clewett setup is and where it can be found?

s2racer

thanks for the info on the tool...