Broken Belts

[Nitrus0nous]

First off, I don't know the first thing about cars unfortunately (yet anyway). Driving home from watching T3 at 4 am, and i get an evil *** squeal, same squeal i hear on occasion when starting the car. So i pull over, get a lil bit of smoke, and the car shuts off...So i sit for a minute or two, pop the hood to make sure there isnt anything leaking. Seems to be all good (again, since i dont know about cars, it could be completely screwed and i prolly wouldn't know). I get the car started and drive my way to the gas station so ii have some light. I get down and I can see a busted belt hanging down. The car was still running, and running fine (as far as i know), so i make the 2 mile drive home goin bout 30 mph. I was wondering if someone could help me out and tell me how serious it is, or tell me which belt it is. . I have more pictures if they would help. Thanks.

http://www.cardomain.com/id/nitrus0nous

ps, also so i know, how many belts does this engine have?

btw 89hatchback

[encasemyheart]

It should have 3 belts.

I believe one is power steering/water pump

one is alternator and

one is air conditioning.

I'm pretty sure that's it, so obviously depending on which belt you broke, it could be more or less serious. If the air conditioning broke, big deal, get a new belt and you're set. If the alternator belt broke, you need a new belt, but also your battery won't be charging, so you won't be able to start it after the battery goes dead, which happend fairly quick. If you broke the P/S/waterpump belt, you just may need a new engine. The car may have overheated if that belt broke. But since you drove 2 miles without catastrophic engine failure, there is a large chance it is not the waterpump belt.

So find out what belt it is. IIRC on my 92 the order from front to back (what belt is closest to the front of the car) is P/S, alternator, air conditioner.

Find out which belt broke and replace it. Belts are like $10 or less. If one broke though, it was probably VERY old, belts don't normally break like that, so I suggest changing them all. You will learn alot in the process too.

[encasemyheart]

Hey, also. This info comes from my experience with me 92, which has a slightly different engine. So a few things may be off, but by looking at your pics, you have 3 belts so it may be the same configuration.

Good luck!

[sammy]

hey.......that looks to be the AC belt......it is the closest to the engine,.....i was just putting a pwr steeringbelt on my 89 this morning.......bad news is that ALL the belts have to come off to replace AC belt.....on 89's the alt belt spins the water pump.....so you can drive the car, just no AC

[Nitrus0nous]

Thanks for the reply's. luckily i'm goin to get all the belts replaced because the p/s belt looks kinda crusty too. So it shouldnt be a big problem. yeah. the a/c is the least of my worries, its not that important. thanks again guys