Good Morning Guys ( afternoon actually hehe ) Well yesterday im driving with my music loud and all of the sudden my steering wheel goes REALLY HARD and I get take a dump, after going home imediatly i see that the serpentine belt is off. After alot of great info from this site and a trip to Autozone to get a few tools i need I notice that the belt tensioner is missing its pulley (is that what its called? the round thing?) and I need to get a new one Anyways what is the recommended maintenance i should do now that im going to have to take off the front of the car to get to the tensioner? The car has got only 43k miles on it and its a 2003 3.0l Quattro, Thanks , always appriciate all your help,

Enrique

 

BTW - I have some pics of what I got done last night.

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q...t/CIMG0880.jpg
http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q...t/CIMG0881.jpg

 

whuts up man? I have a 02 a6, and i believe im having the same problem as u. all symptoms the same(except my music was off, lol). the dealer wont be able to even look at it for a wk. i was wondering how u fixd urs, and if u had any more pics that may help me out. Thanx in advance!

-Roc

 

My '03 3.0 just experienced this failure.

I'd been hearing a bit of a whistling noise comiing from the front of the engine for about a month but couldn't identify what it was exactly. Then my wife was driving the car the other day and it basically died on her (she wasn't a happy camper as it was raining hard and I was out of town so I that wasn't my favorite call for the week).We arranged to have it towed toa nearbyshop.

Before looking at it the guy there told me he thought it would be the alternator and said when the alternator goes it can shut down the battery. I figured that also explained the whistling noise. Anyway, he called me after looking at it and said the accessory belt tensioner fell apart, which of course is why the alternator stopped running.

He quoted me $170 for a new belt and tensioner plus $430 for labor to put it in for a total of $600. I decided I will do it myself this weekend as I picked up the parts at the dealer for only $130, paid him $40 for his diagnostic work, and another $90 to the towguy to pick it up and put it in my garage. I plan on doing the job on Saturday and think it will go okay as I've changed this belt (as well as the timing belt) on a '96 A6 with the 2.8 motor. Anyone know of anything I should be especially careful with working on the 3.0 motor? I've only had the car about 6 months so I figure I'll change the coolant and oil while I'm at it this weekend.

 

HOw many miles on your 3.0?

 

About 55k.

 

Mine's got the noise started... I Know its the ribbed belt (in the booklet it says should be replaced on 120 000 km... (2.7T) now I got 129k)... waiting for the summer[8D]
Hope it wont be hard.. cuz im not mechanical type of guy... at all

 

I successfully replaced the failed serpintine belt tensioner on my wife's '03 A6 - but it turned out to be quite a pain mainly due to the tight quarters. I thought I was going to need to take out the radiator fans, but in the end didn't need to. I did take off the power steering pump and also the metal coolant tube that runs down from the top of the front of the engine.

The tensioner comes in two pieces plus the spring. It comes connected and I thought it might be best to try and install it that way, however I also discovered that it was easier to put it in in three separate pieces. After you finally get the new tensioner in, you will need someone to help you get the belt on. One of you has to move the tensioner to compress the spring in order to create enough slack to slip on the belt. We found that a large open end wrench fit on the big tab on the tensioner and was a good tool for creating the slack. This wrench worked in the place of a "special Audi tool."

I did this same job on a '96 A6 and it was much easier because there is a lot more room and the tensioner was a much simipler design. This one took me about 10 hours all together (including jacking the car and doing some other easy maintenance like changing the oil), although I wasted a bunch of time with the radiator fans. Now that I've done it, it would still take about 5 hours for me to do it again.

 

any luck replacing your belt and tensioner? my tensioner just broke. mechanic quoted me $480 parts and labor. long story short, i had it towed back to my house. now i'm trying to remove the tensioner...got the bolt out but i'm having problems due to lack of space b/t the radiator and engine. any advice?

 

Yes, remove the radiator fan. You'll have plenty of room to work after that. There are three (two?) screws that hold it in, then a metal locking tab at the bottom. Push on the tab at the same time you have someone rotate the fan, and it'll pop right out. You don't even have to disconnect it, just swing it out of the way. It's pretty easy after that.

Oh, and you'll either need a long wrench or a 18" breaker bar with a socket. Makes life a LOT easier when you have to put the belt back on, as it takes a decent amount of force to get the tensioner in position.

Overall, it's not a bad job. Rates one scraped knuckle on the scale.

-Red