Audi 80 TDI alternator belt replacement

The message from chip snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com contains these words:

Which engine?

Its an audi 80 1.9 tdi 90 bhp 1995

The message from chip snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com contains these words:

Ah. Can't help you - I've only got the 2.5 5-cyl.

I can remember having the misfortune of doing a couple water pumps and timing belts on these a few years ago. From what I can remember, I'm sure it wasn't an automatic tensioner as such, and there was some stupid method of removal. (I'm sure there was also a belt that couldn't be adjusted, and had to be removed by unbolting the pulley)

It is a automatic tensioner. But i hope i don't have to take off the bottom pulley, seems a stupid design. I might take off the pulley tensioner wheel and see if i can convert it to some kind of manual adjustment like the water pump. All i need is two strips of thin metal with one hole for the pulley bolt to go through and an elongated hole for the adjustment Can't see why you need all that tension on for a alternator. Most cars i've worked on have a manual adjustment.

is the tensioner pulley held on with a 15mm bolt ? if so you use a spanner to move it away from the belt, some of these auto tensioner have a small hole drilled in the housing so you can put a locking pin through it to keep the tension off the belt.

The auto adjuster is because belts stretch unevenly, auto allows for this, all the auto ones I see have a large nut in the middle which is rotated clockwise to detension the belt.

mrcheerful

That sounds like the answer to me, will try tomorrow and let you know.

Thanks everyone for the quick reply.

Manage to fix the car by doing as suggested.

I had to remove the front engine mounting to get better access to the automatic tensioner, this took about ten minutes to remove. Once this was removed i used a 17mm socket & racket on the wheel face of the tensioner and pulled down hard which was enough to slip the belts over the pulleys.

Thanks again for your help.