2003 Grocery Getter

[lowonthetotem]

I got married about two years ago and have since adopted my wife's 2003 QX4. It runs well, but she has not really done any maintenance on the car aside from having the oil changed regularly and replace the tires over the last 6 to 7 years. The accessory drive belts are squeeling. I haven't checked the tension but went ahead and got new belts anyway considering that the ones on the car have lasted this long. I understand that this may also be an idler pulley issue as well.

I've worked on cars in the past, but not much in the past three or four years. My latest car came with a maintenance agreement, so I haven't had to. Before that I had older cars, which seemed to have alot more room under the hood than this QX4. Are there any short cuts, SOP's, or special tools that I should know or have before starting this? Should I be coming at these belts from the bottom or the top? Should I remove anything from the front of the engine to create more room?

It also seems that she has a leaking cylinder on at least one rear wheel, so I am going to replace that as well. The shoes look fine though. Is there any logic to just replacing other brake components while I have it apart already? They seem to be self adjusting, so besides bleeding the lines into a jar of fluid and pumping them, are there any other concerns that I should be aware of?

My apologies if this has been covered in other threads. I did look at other threads, but I think at least some of what I am asking was not covered. Thanks, in advance, for taking the time to respond.