Hey everyone, I am a member here that has a dodge ram. My dad drives a 2002 dodge stratus with a 4 cylinder(I think it's a 2.4L). He drove up for thanksgiving and said he heard some noises on the way so we checked it out and his serpentine belt was more than half shredded. So we found a store open today(phew...) and got the new belt. As I was about to install it I was checking things to see why it would have shredded and noticed the tensioner was loose. So I tightened it, but it is stripped and won't tighten. He took my car and left his, hoping I can fix it this weekend then trade back.

SO....

My thought is to remove the alternator, then the bracket that the alternator(and tensioner) bolt to, and get a heli coil and drill that hole out and fix it with the heli coil. My question is, for any of you that have dug in to this engine bay, will removing the alternator and bracket be as easy as it looks/sounds? And I'm thinking NAPA should sell the heli coil kits(I hope). I have one but it's not the right size. And by chance does anyone know the size needed?

Thanks in advance, really need to get this car fixed by saturday...sorry in advance for not too much searching ahead, hope you understand the situation...

 

Well I got the alternator and bracket off pretty dang easy. Went to NAPA and got a heli coil kit, going to do the repair in the morning. I think I can "stack" two heli coils as they are only about 1/2 inch long and the bolt hole is about 1 inch long.

I must say the tensioner on this car is a horrible design.

Oh and the damn battery! First thing to do was disconnect the battery......except I couldn't find it lol. Finally realized it's under the headlight and traced the ground wire up, unbolted it from the strut tower and was good. They sure have some strange engineering now a days...

 

Well in case anyone in the future has this issue, it wasn't too bad of a job. Took about an hour to remove the alternator, tensioner, and bracket. I think it took longer to remove the wheel and wheel well and all that than to remove the parts I was working on. Then about 30 minutes to drill, tap, and install the heli coils in the hole in the bracket. Then about another hour to put it all together.

I drove it about 45 minutes to my dad's house to swap cars and it ran fine.