Belt tension

Talk and Tech about turbocharged 924/944/968 cars
944TurboS
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Replacing a water pump on my 951.
Just bought the cam belt tool from Tom in lieu of the P9201.
Now I just need a foolproof way to set the tension on the other 3 belts as newbie.
Balance shaft belt apparently very floppy with 270 degree (?) twist. Any other, more quantitative P9210-less way of going about it?
And what about the power steering belt and the AC / Alternator belt? Could I use a Kricket tool instead of the 90 degree twist method?
Going through the forums, many different opinions…
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Tom
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944TurboS wrote: Sat Jan 04, 2025 7:35 pm Replacing a water pump on my 951.
Just bought the cam belt tool from Tom in lieu of the P9201.
Now I just need a foolproof way to set the tension on the other 3 belts as newbie.
Balance shaft belt apparently very floppy with 270 degree (?) twist. Any other, more quantitative P9210-less way of going about it?
And what about the power steering belt and the AC / Alternator belt? Could I use a Kricket tool instead of the 90 degree twist method?
Going through the forums, many different opinions…
It's time-consuming, but you can reliably set the balance shaft by making it just loose enough that it stops whining. At the high end of the factory spec, 4.0, it will make a slight whine. By 3.5, the mid-point of the spec, the whine is all gone. I've been meaning to do a tool for the balance shaft -- need to get on that! For the p.s. and a/c belts, I'd just use your best judgement. When tightened to spec with the 9201, they are both super tight. So much so, that I don't use the 9201 on those belts and instead tighten them until they feel like normal fan belts. :)

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944TurboS
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What would that tool look like? Similar to the cam belt one?
'88 Porsche 944 Turbo S-Rose Silver
'01 Mercedes ML500-Brill. Silver
'16 BMW X5 40i-Space Grey
'20 BMW X1-M Sport-Blue
'20 BMW X1-Space Grey
21 Audi Q3 S Line -Cosmos Blue
Sold:
'06 Mercedes S55 AMG
'89 Saab 900 SPG Black
'86 Porsche 924S
'82 Porsche 924

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Darwin
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Tom wrote: Sat Jan 04, 2025 8:03 pm
944TurboS wrote: Sat Jan 04, 2025 7:35 pm Replacing a water pump on my 951.
Just bought the cam belt tool from Tom in lieu of the P9201.
Now I just need a foolproof way to set the tension on the other 3 belts as newbie.
Balance shaft belt apparently very floppy with 270 degree (?) twist. Any other, more quantitative P9210-less way of going about it?
And what about the power steering belt and the AC / Alternator belt? Could I use a Kricket tool instead of the 90 degree twist method?
Going through the forums, many different opinions…
It's time-consuming, but you can reliably set the balance shaft by making it just loose enough that it stops whining. At the high end of the factory spec, 4.0, it will make a slight whine. By 3.5, the mid-point of the spec, the whine is all gone. I've been meaning to do a tool for the balance shaft -- need to get on that! For the p.s. and a/c belts, I'd just use your best judgement. When tightened to spec with the 9201, they are both super tight. So much so, that I don't use the 9201 on those belts and instead tighten them until they feel like normal fan belts. :)
I'll start a gofundme for this! I have the arnworx tool and while I am confident in the quality of the installation I've never been able to get rid of the whine.

Please help me Tom!
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Tom
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Darwin wrote: Sun Jan 05, 2025 4:04 am
Tom wrote: Sat Jan 04, 2025 8:03 pm
944TurboS wrote: Sat Jan 04, 2025 7:35 pm Replacing a water pump on my 951.
Just bought the cam belt tool from Tom in lieu of the P9201.
Now I just need a foolproof way to set the tension on the other 3 belts as newbie.
Balance shaft belt apparently very floppy with 270 degree (?) twist. Any other, more quantitative P9210-less way of going about it?
And what about the power steering belt and the AC / Alternator belt? Could I use a Kricket tool instead of the 90 degree twist method?
Going through the forums, many different opinions…
It's time-consuming, but you can reliably set the balance shaft by making it just loose enough that it stops whining. At the high end of the factory spec, 4.0, it will make a slight whine. By 3.5, the mid-point of the spec, the whine is all gone. I've been meaning to do a tool for the balance shaft -- need to get on that! For the p.s. and a/c belts, I'd just use your best judgement. When tightened to spec with the 9201, they are both super tight. So much so, that I don't use the 9201 on those belts and instead tighten them until they feel like normal fan belts. :)
I'll start a gofundme for this! I have the arnworx tool and while I am confident in the quality of the installation I've never been able to get rid of the whine.

Please help me Tom!
Ok, I'll put it at the top-ish of my list. If it is whining, it's tight. The scale is 3.5 +/- .5 on the 9201. If you set it to 4.0, you will have a whine -- not super loud, but it will be there. By 3.5 it seems to stop whining, or at least that's been my experience.

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