I have never had to replace a serpentine belt before and not knowing the history of mine save the 30K miles put on the vehicle since I took possession, it seems like I ought to do this before the belt breaks.I have looked at my Chilton manual which is really not very helpful here, watched youtube videos but they were all from later model years, and taken a look at replacement tension pulleys being offered online. I have also looked at the pulley on my vehicle, of course.

I am NOT seeing a place where I might insert a socket drive breaker bar (I think Chilton says it should be 1/2" drive on my model, not 3/8") so I can push counter clockwise to take the tension off the belt. Can someone enlighten me on where the square hole is actually located? Maybe with a hint I can get somewhere.

Thanks!

 

There should be a square hole on the belt tensioner... I will have to Google to see if the 2.2 engines had the "same" tensioner...

 

notice the small hole right beside the pulley on the tensioner. 2nd pulley down on the left side of the picture.

 

Thanks. I was looking at the offerings here. Obviously, those not for 2.2L were ignored. But I still see two different looking designs. One seems very different with much more metal in place. At first glance, anyway, mine does not look like that. In either case, I don't see any readily accessible square hole. Cheers

 

I see that on yours. I sure did not on mine. Of course, I cannot see anything as well as on yours with my fan and shroud and all in place. I was under the impression I could do this job without removing anything. Is that just a dream? Thanks

 

It is doable without removing anything, but it is a nightmare and hassle to do. atleast remove the upper half of the fan shroud, you will have more room to get your hands in. It was noted in the thread I was reading that the op of that picture did do many upgrades, but as it being the only one I was able to find with a straight view to the tensioner pulley, I went with that. He did say that although "yours" might not look the exact the, it will be similar. So I'm assuming the reason for not seeing the hole is because of the location being so close to the fan location (op removed his).

I actually got that picture off of the s10 forum, found from a quick Google, I have a v6 in mine.

 

Well got the job done in nice weather. Turns out I needed a 3/8" square drive to fit the square hole that is located right where the bolt that passes through where the idler pulley is located. Much better to have a ratchet for easier positioning but I needed a short length of pipe as a cheater. Well worth the extra time to remove the upper fan shroud to make things much easier to see and work around. While installing the new belt, I had to go under the truck and move the spring loaded pulley in order to pass the belt over that pulley from the crankshaft pulley. All in all a nice maintenance chore done. The old belt was not threatening breakage. But it was definitely cracked on the inside surface. Thanks

 

Glad the belt got done!