Late last night after mounting the snowplow on my 93 7.3 I parked the truck. When I shut it off I heard a strange sound, when restarted there was a loud belt squeal. Upon investigation I found it had shed the serpentine belt. Fortunately I had a new one , unfortunately the reason it shed the belt was a broken tensioner bolt. Since I had to plow I made a flanged sleeve and found a long bolt that fit, managed to get the broken piece out, and by 4 AM was ready to roll. Ain't snow plowing grand!

Now the question. How often do these bolts break? Was the bolt defective? Break caused by flexing of a loose shoulder bolt? Or is the design faulty and failure common?

I think my fix is good for the long haul, but if it's not a common problem I might get a new bolt and fix it original.

 

the same thing happened to me about 2 months ago. i was going fishing got about 100 ft away from my house and i heard a loud knocking pulled over looked and found the fan hitting the tensioner i thought the bolt just came loose but nope wasnt that lucky it broke off. i had to drill it out and put a helicoil in its place than replaced the whole tensioner assembly bolt and all. your case is the only other time i have heard of this happening to anyone but me. i remember that when this happened i was reading some info that said in 93 ford recalled the tensioner or the piece it bolts into i cant remember which. well good luck and hope it holds for you.
mike

 

There have been a ton of recalls, upgrades, changes in belt length etc since I got my 93...... I've gone through 3 tensioners in 175K miles, I advise checking the tensioner every couple oil changes minimum.

 

I just changed mine, the bolt wasn't broken, but the tesioner was wobbling so bad that it actually elongated the hole the bolt goes through on the tensioner. I think I caught mine just in time.

 

I had this happen to me about 2 weeks ago. Had a squeal and heard the fan clicking on something. Looked under the hood and the tensioner was cocked over but it had not shed the belt.The lower idler pulley was holding it on. Had to take the bracket loose and got the bolt out from the backside with a pair of visegrips.

 

I have not had this problem with my 1993 and never really gave it a thought until now. Now I am glad I read this thread. Learn new things everyday.

 

Mine just started to squeal not to long ago, so I changed the pulley ($45 at Napa). When I re-installed the bolt, I put some threadlocker on it. I hope it won't come loose now.

Guy

 

Well I see I'm not the only one. I think I'll leave my fix on, and maybe change the bolt at intervals just to be on the safe side.

If it was me I wouldn't use thread locker because if it does break it will be really hard to get out. I'd rather just torque it and check once in a while.