serpentine belt falling off

Why is it after replacing a new belt and new tensioner, the belt comes off in the rain, snow and going through puddles? I wasted money on these and they are less than a year old and I have to replace them with a kit containing the same thing except they are grooved? It came off on my wife over a dozen times. No power steering (no control), no water pump (engine overheats causing dangerous to aluminum heads), no alternator (no battery charging), no AC. All powered by ONE belt. $40 a pop to put the belt back on. An independent recommended a kit, parts and labor, over $300. We then found a radiator leak, thinking the slick antifreeze was causing the belt to come off, so I spent the $300 replacing a new radiator. Still the belt came off. I have looked over numerous forums on the web and with all the problems with Dodge, Plymouth, Chrysler vans, why do we have to pay to get it fixed? I thought I'd be smart and start out with some "cheaper fixes". One guy was selling disks to put over the tensioner and idle pulley for $30. I found the disk covers from Advance for $8 apiece and installed them on both idle and tension pulleys and thought how smart I was until I went through a puddle...twice and both times it came off. I started looking at the Dayco 89251 from Advance, but it is a smooth tension pulley. My wife called me today and guess what...she went through a puddle. So..here I am ordering a Gates 38379K kit from Amazon $111.63 incl. S & H. Advance has Goodyear kit 49215K for $124.99 plus tax, but it had to be ordered. You can also order separate double sided belt, grooved idle and tension pulleys, but they total more than $111. The double sided belt is over $65. CONTACT THE NHTSA on their web site or call them at 888-327-4236. I am surprized if someone hasn't gotten KILLED yet!!!

The serpentine belt may come off due to a worn tensioner, idler pulley or pulley alignment. You should have a qualified technician look at the belt alignment while the engine is running. Anything that looks out of alignment at that point should be repaired. If everything looks ok the fault could be with the tensioner or idler pulley. You may need to replace the tensioner, idler pulley, and the serpentine belt to correct the problem.

As Russ stated, the belt tensioner is usually the culprit, however, if you have had the power steering pump or water pump replaced, the pulley can be out of alignment. In rare cases, the generator pulley or the crankshaft damper pulley can shift out of alignment or the crankshaft thrust bearing can wear causing the crankshaft to have excessive play which would cause misalignment. A qualified repair shop should have a pulley alignment checker which uses a laser beam to check alignment. Also, all grooves in the pulleys must be free of all debris. Since you live in an are where snow is likely, you must have the belt shield attached to the right frame rail as snow will cause the belts to come off.

My mom has a 2000 Grand Caravan Sport with the 3.3L V6. Best running van in the country until it rains. Where she lives the roads tend to have ruts worn down in them from the big trucks. The water pools in these ruts and if you hit one, down she goes. No steering and no water pump. The one time it happened to me the engine over heated almost immediatly. You can't drive them a block even if you can armstong the steering the engine will over heat in just minutes. We started driving this thing with kid gloves everytime it rained, but still if you had to swerve a little bit to mis a car or if the water crossed the road where you couldn't avoid it. You were setting there waiting a mechanic to come put the belt back on. I'm glad Johnny mopar gave his answer. I knew there should be some kind of shielding to keep this from happening. Anyone know where to find one?

check and reposition the drain hose that that collects the water from the windshield. It is located to the left of the serpentine belt, close to the firewall. It is supposed to be attached to the drain duct from the cowl cover. It has to be removed to replace the belt. It mat be inadvertently not been replaced. You have to tug at it to discover this at times. since it is usually in the proper position. Only it is not attached to the drain. This will cause water to flow onto the belt and the resultant belt slip when it rains. Hope thi help. It will eventually damage the alternator too.

i realize this has been a year ago but if you have not resolved the problem it is probably the tension pulley. I had mine replaced & have not had one bit of trouble since. However, now my airbag, cruise, & horn are not working. found online that it is probably the clockspring. anyone know of a good sight that will tell me how to replace the clockspring?

Chrysler has actually issued a recall for the clockspring malfunction. No matter how many miles you have on it, you should be able to take it into any Chrysler dealership to have it replaced free of charge. Like you said, apparently this problem affects the steering wheel controls (cruise, volume), as well as the horn and airbag. You can go to this website (http://www.dodge.com/webselfservice/dodge/index.jsp?screenName=recall&country=us&emailurl=goToEmailForm%28%27R%27%29) type if your vin number, and print out a letter for the recall. Hope that helps!

Our (serpentine) drive belt came off after about 6 years of driving. We muscled the steering wheel and drove the van to advance auto parts since power steering went out.. We still had the manufacturer belt under the hood and I am new to this problem. Our belt came off because our water pump was totally shot, so I asked someone to put it back on with a 15mm wrench. A 17 year old kid came up and said he'd put the belt back on. He did it in about 15 minutes with the wrench and a flashlight since it was night time. however, the belt stayed on about 10 minutes after driving so we had to do something. I walked back to Advance auto parts and bought the Dayco poly grip belt which was about $42.00 with tax. I had a new water pump put on and the van is running ok. I went with the poly grip belt because it was only $10.00 more then a regular serpentine and had a 1 year warranty instead of 90 day. I trust the poly grip more then I do the standard grip because if one of the pulleys is slipping or water gets on it, it has a better chance of staying on. So what I am saying is if you get a new serpentine belt, go with the Dayco poly grip belt for $10.00 more. The warranty is 1 year and you can even feel the way the van drives after putting it on, that the grips aren't going to slip off the pulleys. It just feels more snug in my opinion.

My mom has the same problem with 1998 grand caravan. It turns out that there is a problem with the pcm and it allows the a/c compresor to over pressureize and blow out the releif valve. the valve is facing the belt and pulley and thus sprays refridgerant and oil under high pressure on the belt to make it come off. I have not replaced the pcm yet but if it works I'll let you know.

how do yu check tension on serp. belt 1998 jeep 4.0