Alternator Belt

[Jim001]

This is a Ford V8 EFI 5.0L. It wears through alternator belts in just a few hours. Had pulleys reconditioned in spring but no improvement. The only advice I get is to tighten belt with a crowbar. They also said new pulleys are not available. Any ideas?

 

[dennis461]

if this is a v belt, make sure it is in the right groove and the right size

 

[sandkicker]

Did it always (while you owned it) do this, or is it a new problem???

 

[Lepke]

Ongoing belt failures are usually caused by pulley misalignment or the belt trying to transfer too much horsepower. If the alternator has a bad bearing or the alt is putting out too many amps for the belt the belts will fail. If you replaced the stock alt with a high amp alt, it may require more of the engine hp than the belts can take. Or if the regulation part of the alt fails and is putting out max amps it can eat belts. Most auto parts stores will test an alt for free.
Also bad battery cables can have too much resistance for normal charging and cause the alt to continuously put out high amps.