How do you put the serpentine belt back on a 1996 Mercury Mystique?

Answer 1

How to replace the serpentine beltI just replaced my '96 Mystique's Serpentine Belt three weeks ago! It is suprisingly simple, although it helps to have small hands if you can't raise the car off the ground. It is more of a right hand maneuover than a left, due to the spatial constrictions of where the belt goes. I will explain this as though you are standing facing the car, and looking from the top, down at the engine:

• You should see a little diagram on the driver's side of your car, right beneath where the hood meets the frame (towards you and on the metal). It is a diagram of the 'water pump' pulley, which is where the serpentine belt belongs. Use this as a visual aid. The belt turns the cylindrical wheels of the pulley such that the pump pushes coolant as the engine heats up.*

1. You will see a number of small tubes (I think there are three) forming am 'L' shape horizontally across the area right over the pulley that the serpentine belt manipulates. You may or may not be able to see the belt (mine had popped off, shredded, so I never saw a belt until I replaced it!!).

2. If you scoot the tubes to your left and hold them, you should be able to stick your right hand into the triangle of the pulley by thrusting it directly down into the narrow opening beneath where the tubes were.

3. Take a flashlight and shine some light into the opening with the hand that is not in the pulley area. Take your hand that is in the pulley area and move it forwards (towards the dash) a bit; you should feel a cylinder about 1-1.5 inches wide, with grooves in it. This is the largest wheel in the pulley. Move the same hand back a bit (towards you); you should feel a smaller cylinder with a small tensioner (you can test this by pulling towards you, gently-- it should want to move back towards the grooved cylinder). There is one more cylinder in the pulley; it is lower, underneath where your hand is. You can feel it by moving your hand further in and towards you.

4. Take the serpentine belt and wrap it around all the cylindrical wheels of the pulley, but keep the tensioner on the outside of the pulley-- it holds the belt to the wheels while the mechanism is turning.

5. You can test your fix by starting the engine and watching the coolant flush through the lines... it won't bubble back up at you as it might have been doing without the belt on. You will also get warm air when you put the heat on.

The whole process takes about 5 mins once you know where to look and where to put the belt. The tensionr applies all necessary pressure afterwards, so you're spared having to adjust the belt once it's on. Clever, eh?

-Tina.