I'm doing my Saturday PMs on all the cars and noticed something strange on my kid's 86 240. The alternator is cocked, causing a bend in the two belts that drive it (why two belts?). I crawl under the car, and it appears that the rubber bushings theat the distributor mounting bolts go thru are worn. Are these special Volvo bushings, or would a standard rubber bushing of the same length and diameter work? I'll probably do this when I do the timing belt/seals job this week.
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Blane Gardner Couple of Volvos, Couple of Toyota Vans, and an Old Chebby

Thanks everyone. Got the three new bushings today and installed them. The end flange was completely gone on the front one, allowing the alternator to shift about an inch forward of where it should be. All is well now. Maybe the timing belt and front seals tomorrow...
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Blane Gardner Couple of Volvos, Couple of Toyota Vans, and an Old Chebby

Blane -

Another thing about the alternator belts. The Volvo belts are a matched set. Others may be, I don't know. When the belts are made, a matched set is made from the same big piece and have the same stretch characteristics. Only once have I tried a NAPA-type belt, never again. The corner parts store folks seem to know nothing about matched sets and will pooh-pooh your rebuttal whilst trying to sell you two of the same size, but not a matched set. Get a Volvo set.

They use two belts because there is a need for that much power transmission to drive the alternator under full load.

Good Luck,

Bob

:>)

The three on the alternator and the four on the York a/c type power steering pump, they can be all a PITA. My solution for easy installation is to coat the bushing with a a film of ATF, and sometimes carve a bevelled edge on the inserting end. It always works. BTW I use AFT as it won't attack rubber.

Good Luck,

Bob

:>)

I'm not sure if the bushings are anything special - I just went with the polyurethane replacements from IPD. About $6.50 each. Their big catalog had a table listing how many you'd probably need for each accessory. The alternators want three (two on the mounting bracket, one on the adjusting bit). Probably a good idea to check the wires on the back of the alternator - my money says that the thin wire is going to look pretty mangy.

I'd love to report success. All three nearly slid out with the tap of a finger (yikes). I put two in just fine. However, that front one I !@#@!'d up and tried to put the insert in before the bushing was pushed in. And I cleaned out the sleeve. OOPS. Lots of friction, and now I've got maybe 1/16 inch to go before the alternator will even fit in there. *sigh*

REALLY FRUSTATING.

- alex

if you do not replace the bushing, the alternator will have a tendency to vibrate. When it vibrates, the drive belt will bang around on the alternator pulley, which in turn will overload your alternator bearing and cause its premature failure. In otherwords, replace the bushings at your first opportunity.

I can only guess that there are two belts becasue of the relatively small angle of contact beween the belts and the pulley. My 760 can get awway with using one belt because the belt wraps almost half way around the alt pulley and therefore is able to transmit much more power. I cant recall how much belt contact there is on the 240 but it aint much. I replaced my power steering pump and alt bushings a few weeks ago and my squeking belts are gone and piece of mind returned.

Matt

All I can say is Volvo knew what they were doing. I tried running my 84 with one belt for a bit. The car chewed it up pretty quick.

If you need a quick fix, rotate the bushings 180º, that might straighten it out for a while. Why two belts? maybe volvo doen't want us stranded out in the middle of nowhere.

-Bruce

Get some new bushings from the dealer of IPD and replacem them. Pretty easy. Get a complete set and do them all!
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Warren Bain - '86 744Ti M46 >285Kmi, '96 965 >99Kmi Wifemobile near Manassas Va.. I get no e-mail replies to my postings.