Hey there!

The car in question is a 99 4.3 Blazer. Having gynormous belt squeak. I'm about to replace belt and sand down pulleys and i need to know if the way the tensioner moves is normal (i know it's supposed to move, but i lack experience with them..). See if i replace it or not before the weekend not to screw up a new belt!

Video;
BTW, you may want to turn down your volume, sound isnt pleasing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAUqB_X_bY0

 

Yes movement is normal. The way to check the tensioner is to move it all the way in. If it snapps right back all the way out quickly and the bearing on the pully is ok then its fine. If it comes back slowly or not all the way or a bad bearing replace it. I believe the gatorback belts work the best for eliminating squeek also.

 

Well the bearing sounds decent, the tensioner has about 2 years on it. It's not new, but it's not all wobbly neither. The tensioner itself offers decent tension while looseing it and coming back to it's position (to remove the belt) and moves without binding abnormal resistance.

I just bought a new belt from the dealer, instead of the Gates we usually buy. I'll clean up the pulleys and probably pass some sanding paper on them because some look abit too soft (more prone to slip). If nothing does it, i'll replace the tensionner since none of the pulleys seem to have bearing problems.

 

I had a similar squeal in my '00 Jimmy 4.3 engine. I thought it was the idler pulley. That did not fix it. The only thing it needed was a new belt. Robertr is correct. Get a Gatorback belt.

 

is it normal to flicker around say twice as much as that one? mine moves really fast and about 2x further....