Hey, I somehow managed to shear off a bracket holding a tensioner pulley and caused my serpentine belt to come off (truck now stranded at an oil site in North Dakota...). I know I could re-thread the hole and put a new bracket and pulley in, but my question is since the pulley wasn't powering anything if I could just get a shorter belt and bypass it? I doesn't "look" like the belt wouldn't be able to stay on, but I could be totally wrong. Anyone tried this? It's the 3.9L A/C, power steering, etc...


Different Issue: My shifter is so loose that hitting some bumps or driving on dirt roads knocks it into neutral... how intensive of a job is it to fix the shifter? Or how much do you think it would cost to have fixed?

Thanks guys!

 

You could, I guess, but if your 3.9 is anything like the 5.2, the idle pulley is part of the routing of the serpentine belt. Everything has to be routed properly for all the components to turn in their proper directions. I realize that finding a wrecking yard in your part of the country might be difficult, but maybe you could find a yard online that would look for that bracket (on my engine it has the tensioner, alternator, & a/c pump on it, too.) Or if you have the sheared off part, get someone locally to weld it back on 'til you can get the proper parts.

Sorry to sound like an old poop, but I learned long ago to do it right or don't do it at all.