Help! The Secret Information

...rotation. Firstly make sure if you have the kind with tabs that the bigger tab is in the correct hole...even if you don't make sure that it slides on freely without belt and slipp it back in the same orientation with belt. Now, to tighten. Tightent turn tighten turn. The pulley will pinch tthe belt....the turning will free the belt....use large wrench on crank pulley nut to turn. Maybe you can have your assistant show ya what to do with the crank... =-))

..Gareth

Inge, that innocent child, has a healthy curiosity about such things and is willing to learn. We'll start the lessons tonight.

You say, "Use large wrench on crank pulley nut to turn."

Which worked just fine, thanks.

But . . . imagine, if you will, that you are the proud new owner of a

1971 bus. Imagine that it is 1971. After a few weeks, you dutifully check the oil, the brake fluid, tire pressure, veeblefetzer tension arm and, hello, the generator belt is loose. Ah-ha, the Owner's Manual shows how to tighten it and Volkswagen even provided a nice tool that fits on the end of the lug wrench to take the pulley apart. So there you are, the wife and kids are waiting for you to take them to that nice 1971's picnic (everything in burnt orange, harvest gold and avocado green, the colors of the time) and you take the pulley off, take out a shim, and then . . . darned if not only does the O.M. not describe how to put the darn thing back together, but . . . did VW provide that 30mm wrench? Wife and kids are gonna be pissed off. The 17 year-old is already wandering off behind the garage to smoke pot with his hippie friends and your wife is thinking that maybe wife-swapping is not such a bad idea after all. I bet Ralph, she thinks, could get that stupid germinator belt -- or whatever it is -- back on. And he looks very groovy with his new sideburns.

But I digress. A lot.

...so if I had held out opn my timely response I coulda gotten your wifes cell phone number??? =-)))

....ah well 3000 miles is a bit far to drive for attempted wife stealin anyhow..

...Gareth

I have an alternator, not a generator, but I think it's the same. I do not turn the crank pulley nut, I turn the alternator nut which both tightens it and turns the belt properly into position higher up the groove as it turns. One tool, not 2.

Then some brilliant German engineer put a coupla squarish notches in the inside rim of the inside alternator pulley half, just in the right spot to stick a big flat screwdriver or equivalent tool in there to jam the pulley against the frame of the alternator or whatever to keep it from turning so you can give that alternator nut the last bit of torque it needs to keep it on.

Does the older generator pulley also have these slots? If so, use'em, squirrel.

Oh BTW - wanted to swap - one wife 40 for 2 wives 20.

Can't get it to work that way. Tightening the nut just kind of mooshes the belt between the pulley halves, it shows no inclination to move up away from the generator axle. Maybe I'm just not trying hard enough.

It does, it does, and the owner's manual shows a fellow shoving a longish screwdrive down behind the pulley, vertically. It blandly tells the owner to mash the other end of the screwdriver against the generator mounting bolts, which totally confuses me, since I can't see anything like that behind the pulley. So there is apparently somedarnthing back behind there.

Look you horndogs -- the wife-swapping thing was part of my "imagine it's 1971" trip into the past. Not today, okay? Those of you old enough to remember that era, will recall that wife-swapping some kind of hip 'n' groovy thing that folks too old to be hippies but young enough to be hip were experimenting with. Those too young to have been there, or were somewhere where folks were not interested in being hip 'n' groovy, or have forgotten all about it, could rent Ang Lee's brilliant "The Ice Storm" for a refresher. He captures the era perfectly.

So, Oldbie and Gareth, dial up your time machines for 1971. Gareth, when you get there your cell phone will be a scientific puzzle but useless. If you can find me, you can have the wife -- she was a bore and I was in San Francisco trying to furgle the students at the all-girl's school where I scored a job in the gardening department.

"I'd rather have two girls at twenty-one, than one girl at fourty-two."

-- W.C. Fields.

Oh - you must have an engine with the "compression" option - hahaha. Whatever works - maybe your belt's the slightly longer generator one, making your fan a bit slow and causing you to create slightly less electricty. I guess I usually do the first coupla turny bits by hand on the belt to help it along. ===============

I stick it just below horizontal into the alternator cooling holes and line up one of the slots that way, , being careful not to gouge up the copper wire wraps that I can just see inside. ===============

A coupla years back I dialled mine up to 2000, got on the Internet, and found a wife hiding out in southern Philippines - amazing young girl - wouldn't trade her for a world of twenty-one year olds. Just got word this morning that her immigration is a major step closer to approval, so I'll finally be leaving here and coming home soon. ===============

I am the worst mechanic in the WORLD, but I can get a belt on.... this may help or sound moronic (tired here), but an X shaped old-style lug wrench fits on my 1600 dp... a big adjustable wrench, with a big screwdriver (held by wife) works, if you don't torque either down too much, AND--- a generator and an alternator have 2 different size belts... the local store may sell you the wrong one, so I'd get mine from aircooled.net.....

wrote:

your fan a bit slow and

first coupla turny bits by

one of the slots that

a wife hiding out in

twenty-one year olds.

approval, so I'll finally

Well, I'm not the worst mechanic in the world, just very inexperienced. I used to watch my dad tear apart his MG TD's, and my brother work on his Delorean, while I was delving into the innards of old radios and tape recorders. They acquired a great amount of skill working on autos. I ended up knowing how electronic things work . . . and now, the Wonderbus. I'm trying to catch up to their -- and RAMVA folks's -- level of skill.

I like to study a problem before I open up the patient, just in case I get in so deep that I can't close the patient without needing to buy a. some fancy tool, or b. some part that can only be gotten through mail order, since this is a daily use family car. I find the Bentley's manual to be less than I'd like for this and would love to find a real shop manual. Having no luck there yet.

"Mike Rocket J. Squirrel Elliott" wrote

Try here: