I decided to replace the water pump on my 99 Ram 1500 4x4 5.2 liter. I replaced it because I was hearing what I thought was a worn bearing noise and since the truck has 90k on it, I figured it's time. I replaced the pump with new gasket according to the instructions in Hayes manual and everything seemed to go fine. I filled the coolant and double checked the belt routing etc. Started her up and checked for leaks and everything was 100% for about 1 minute, then a squealing noise started to come on and got very loud. I shut it down and rechecked the belt alignment and routing again. In fact, took the belot off again and put it back on just to be sure. Started it back up and same thing, only not quite as loud, but definately not driveable. The other weird thing is when I goose the gas pedal, when the RPM drops the engine stumbles and a couple of times stalled out. It's as if there is a load on the engine. I took the belt off again and turned the water pump, AC pulley, PS pulley and idler pulley and none of them had any resistance. Put the belt back on and problem still there. I was wonderring if it's possible I damaged the fan clutch somehow, but searched and seems like those symptoms would be different. Hoping you guys can throw me some ideas on how to troubleshoot this one. Thanks!

 

Ok, I just found a couple of posts which said that if you get coolant on the serpentine belt, it will cause it to squeal. I did get coolant on the belt, but didn't think much of it, just wiped it off with a rag. If I take the belt off and hose it down real good and dry it, will that be good enough or do these belts get ruined with any coolant on it? Belt onlt has about 15k miles on it and is in good shape otherwise.

 

if you remove the belt completely and start the truck, does it rev/idle ok, run quiet, and not stall ?
with belt removed, if you try to wiggle the water pump pulley, is there any play ?
check for rubbing of wp pulley against wp housing.
test the fan by removing it from the wp pulley.
most likely a bad bearing in the water pump [:@]

 

coolant will not hurt the belt. nor will it make it squeal, unless its so wet its slipping, and even then it should dry within a few seconds.
also try spraying wd-40 on the belt. that will temporaily silence a noisy belt.

 

Did you buy a new belt or re-use the old one? I always replace the belt with new W/P and keep the old in the truck for a spare.All our cars now have a spare because I've had one fail before. Even if it doesn't stop the squealing (and it did stop a little squeal in both my trucks) it gives peace of mind.90K if it hasn't been changed you've got your monies-worth already. Just my dos centavos

 

The orignal sound you heard may have from the belt tensioner not the water pump have you checked that. when mine went bad it sounded simaler to bearings in an altinator failing. the tensioner is about 100 bucks if you replace that use a new belt

 

how do you know if the belt tensioner is going bad? when i bought my 01 ram 1500 it had a noise like i never heard before kind of like something is loose or something only by the front of the motor of to the passinger side a little. is it ok of the water pump pully wiggles a little bit? i just checked it and it will wiggle in and out a little bit. it that the noise i am hearing the bearing in the water pump going out its been that way since i got the truck about 4 months ago

 

That happened to my water pumpalso:

https://dodgeforum.com/m_874873/mpag.../tm.htm#874873

 

Thanks for all the replies guys. I started the truck today and there isn't anymore squealing noise, so I am assuming it was the coolant and it dried overnight. The belt is only about 15k miles old, had replaced it last year, replaced the tensioner last year as well. I am still getting some noise from one of the pulleys up front, I think it's the idler pulley (I think that's what it's called). Anyway, hopefully it runs good, guess I will find out tomorrow as I need to take it to work and will be about 100 miles round trip.