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my wife’s 1999 Camry ever since it had a new AC compressor put on and AC recharged makes a high pitch squealing noise every morning now when she fires it up…Seems like every time the fan is kicked on it does that but then goes away after a bit..Any suggestions? Would love to get it taken care of for her. Thanks Dan Church (Georgia)
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I guess there’s a couple of things you could check in this case to isolate components.
Check the belt grooved side for cracks or glazing, especially check it if you bend the grooved side back and open, there should still be no visible cracks.
you can run power and ground to both electric fans one at a time listen for that noise, maybe they are going bad, just a thought!
Can you consistently get the noise to come and go when power the a/c on and off? powering it on and off could still be caused by either belt or compressor.
you may check these things if you haven’t already.
wish I could think of something more right now! Have fun!Eric has a video on belts and pulleys you might want to check out. It could be a glazed serpentine belt or maybe a defective belt tensioner or something along those lines… I would check out his video, it will help out tons.
Peace.
Commonest cause would be a weak belt tensioner. I would be sure the belt is correctly positioned on the pulleys, and I would flex the tensioner to see if it has spring. If not it’s easy to replace, though you might get it working better with a small amount of oil. Most mechanics would replace the belt if they had it off for some other reason, so another thought would be the question as to whether they replaced it with the correct belt when you had the A/C serviced.
Hi Dan,
Both mss829 and spelunkerd have provided excellent suggestions. A couple other comments/thoughts that I would like to add:
1. Was the previous AC/alternator belt re-used after the compressor was replaced?
2. Do you know if the shop that performed the repair removed the AC/alternator drive belt via the belt tensioner, or did the shop loosen the alternator enough to slip the belt off? I would presume the former, but if the alternator was loosened up, it may have not been repositioned properly upon belt reinstallation. Check for excess play in this belt.
Good luck. Keep us posted.
You’ve got some great suggestions here, here is a link to that belt and pulley video that I did. Good luck.
If memory serves, the AC belt on the 1999 Camry is tensioned by the alternator. You’re going to need a ratchet, a 10mm socket, a 12mm socket and a 14mm socket. Loosen the 14mm bolt that sits between the alternator and the engine block about a turn and a half or so, the on the other side of teh alternator you should see a long bolt with a metal cube attached to it. Loosen the short bolt that goes into the cube a couple of turns (it’s either a 10mm or a 12mm, I forget which) and then tighten the long bolt, which will pull the metal cube up it, making the belt get tighter. When the belt feels snug, push on the belt with a finger between the alternator pulley and the AC pulley. It shouldn’t move more than about a quarter of an inch or so, then tighten back down everything that you loosened. Start the engine and see if it still squeaks. If the squeak is still there, and the belt isn’t glazed or cracked or anything, make it a little tighter. Lather rinse and repeat until the squeak goes away..
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