That's a point for Alta. Anyone else?

 

Guess very few have gotten this or there have been no complaints, otherwise this thread would've been bombarded.

 

What happens if you push the car hard? Does the belt feels under-tensioned or over-tensioned like some people said?

 

I'm now starting to get some squeal @ 6k+ rpms. Gonna get in there and tighten it up a bit, eventually. Other than that, no problems. Closing in on 7000 miles with it.

 

Periodic tightening is expected like any adjustable tensioner. Thanks, MTY.Now, we have, at least, some emperical data to log for getting average interval. 7k mi between adjustments ain't bad at all. Is your car driven hard all the time? What are your driving habits, MYT?

 

I wouldn't say I drive it hard all the time, but definitely am not babying it. I've been doing a lot of angry driving over the past month, so that may have led to the squeal.

 

7k mi of angry driving w/o worries of snapped belt consequences, failing bushes/damper seem like more pluses. Anyone out there ever abused these on track? How're the engine & belt behaving?

 

Any more updates on how these things are holding up?

 

My only question is how do you change belts while the alta tensioner is installed?? Do you have any install instructions yet?

 

Basically reverse order of installation. You need to loosen the tensioner until the belt is slack.

 

I just installed on of these last night. Simple job. One question though, when you guys are adjusting the tension are you taking the wheel off and liner or just doing it from the top?

I need to tweak the tension as it is slipping at around 5k. Really don't wanna do more than necessary though.

Any input?

 

Bought one of these off a member here. Will be installing shortly. My car just clicked 100k so I feel like I'm pushing my luck with the stock tensioner. The car is basically stock motor wise but I do drive it hard, and now my wife wants to get into autocross with me. I will report back with intall issues (if any) and hopefully a longer term update.

 

10k miles later and still no issues. Just the occasional adjustment.

 

How has the reliability on this been? My K060535 NAPA belt just blew up while out at the track, with no part stores even close by, and an original 04 crank pulley too. I am thinking of doing the Alta 0% crank pulley and a Gates k060539HD belt(trying to talk Gates into making their Racing blue belt in a k060535 size to hand higher heat). Without the spring shock setup and the Alta crank Pulley with no dampening, would this cause more vibration and damage?

 

I installed the tensioner last week and used it on two full days at the track. So far so good. I did have to tighten it down quite a bit to avoid belt squeal above 6000RPM - seemingly well beyond the amount of tension provided by the stock tensioner spring, even though I never had belt squeal with the stock setup.

The belt seems to have made it through the weekend just fine, even though the car was mostly running well above 5000RPM for a total of over 4 hours track time.

I have a 17% pully, an ATI 0% crank dampener and the 060520 belt.

I am hearing a bit more noise from the belt train. Tracking it down with an auto stethoscope, it seems to be coming from the tensioner pulley itself. It was probably not in the greatest shape when I installed the Alta tensioner -- I installed it because the shock absorber had gone bad. The car would squeak up a storm at idle due to the sloppy shock absorber and tensioner pulley bouncing around.

I would definitely recommend taking along a spare belt and a tensioner tool, just in case.

 

I just installed this last week on my R53. Super easy install. No need to lift engine either (despite instructions). I left the belt on the car and just removed the passenger wheel and liner and crush tube. (already had bumper off for other work). Used a gearwrench ratcheting box-end and it only took 5 minutes to swap the two tensioners. The biggest pain was simply tightening it (had to flip the wrench back and forth to get wrench on it after every rotation)

 

Subaru, Mazda, Ford are some of the makes now using Stretchfit self-tensioning belts w/o a tensioner mechanism. Gates & Goodyear make some of the aftermarket versions of these. If anyone can point to a source of these elastic self-tensioning belts in 6PK 1388/1374 fitments, then, we can all swap these terrible dampers w/ the Alta 1 & not even have to worry about periodic manual adjustments. The belt will do the self-tension.

Anyone? Calling out the vendors Alta, Way, Pelican, Outmotoring & others to help us get these stretchfit belts. Who knows, this might be the best solution for our tensioner damper woes.

 

That would be cool.
But do these others use a self-tensioning belt for superchargers or just the 'normal' accessories? I would think that our belts have higher demands placed on them than is typical.

mandd

 

Other factors come into play like load, power output & torque among others. If stock belts have worked fine for this app, then having those stretchfit belts would be even better. Now, can anyone help source?

 

Just an update. I've tried how the drive felt w/ a busted tensioner damper, how new it felt w/ a new tensioner.......Dug into my tensioner assembly today for inspection. Damper resistance still good.
Decided to swap it w/ the adjustable Alta. Marked the tiny stock tensioner stop above the spring as base for proper belt tension......
Guess what....It felt better than having a new damper. Call it psychological, but drive was way smoother. Alternator voltage saw consistent maxima/minima. Idle fluctuation range seems more limited.
This is my 1st impression on test, not yet a recommendation. We'll yet have to see how this does long term.
I'm still in search of those STRETCH Belts!

 

BREAKING News!!!!! REALLY BREAKING NEWS! After a full 9month term & just 2k mi, the 12yr old tensioner broke. The cast alloy couldn't take the varying load w/ constant resistance from the adjustable stop.



How it was discovered? Had a nagging low rpm (around 900-1krpm) vibration from full stop. This was on the way home from a rewarding road trip. Engine response & power delivery was unhampered & smooth. This vibration reminded me of the noise from the notched plate tensioner stop I used to have w/ the stock damper. Checked the tensioner & upon attempting to tighten the bolt w/o force, the Alta just fell lifeless on my ATI. Blessed to have caught it early. Oh well, twas good while it lasted. Now, though the vibration is gone, I'm forced to go back to the lousy old damper. That's the saddest part.

 

Those who've installed, check your tensioner.

 

Have you talked to Alta about this yet?

 

Can't really blame Alta. Loved it while it worked. They tried to come up w/ a great ingenious solution to replace the stock tensioner damper. The tensioner alloy just couldn't handle the stress. Guess we're now stuck w/ no choice but to keep buying the entire Gates/Litens assembly just to extract that Stabilus damper.
Someone, please come up w/ a better DAMPER!!!!!!

 

My stock damper lasted for 9 years & over 110,000 miles. It was replaced at that time while doing the ATI damper install & no it wasn't broken. I see no reason to reinvent the wheel like ALTA tried to do???