9-5 serpentine belt replacement                                                            

Tools required for belt change:

Additional tools required for pulley changes:

* Apparently Saab recommended switching to a shorter belt at some point.  The shorter belt skips the middle idler pulley.  That's one less idler pulley to wear out, but there seem to have been a lot of complaints about excessive belt noise at idle.  Frankly, if the belt is beating enough to make noise, I don't want it - the general recommendation seems to be to stick with the longer belt and use the middle pulley.  It may be that at some point Saab eliminated the center pulley on the 9-5; I'm not sure about this.

Any time the serpentine belt is removed you should inspect the pulleys carefully.  They can be dry and rattle-y and still spin very freely, so don't automatically assume that a free-spinning pulley is a good pulley.  I replaced all three of mine when I got the car at around 90 k miles.  The middle one was pretty quiet and tight but the rear pulley and the tensioner pulley rattled  some when spun or even when shaken, which indicates little if any grease in the bearings.  In general, I think I'd be inclined to replace the belt every 30 k miles and the pulleys every 90 k miles (the book says to replace the belt every 60 k miles and says nothing about pulley replacement).  You could even do the pulleys every 60 k miles just to be safe.  The pulleys run about a hundred bucks for the set, but that's not much to invest every 60 k miles!  The serpentine belt drives the alternator, AC, steering pump and, most important, the water pump, so if the belt or a pulley fails you have to stop driving the car almost immediately.  Driving with a non-functional serpentine belt will cause engine overheat in short order, and that will blow the head gasket at least, will probably warp the head and, worst case, will cause the engine to self-destruct.

Belt Removal

The manual doesn't say to remove the wheel well liner, but it doesn't seem reasonable to try to get the belt looped around the crank pulley without having access to the crank pulley.

Loosen the 17 mm wheel bolts on the U.S. passenger side - just break them loose.  Jack the front of the car and support it on stands.  Remove the U.S. passenger-side wheel.

Remove the wheel well liner

Remove the bottom splash panel

The manual calls for removing the power steering hose bracket from the subframe so that a wooden wedge can be driven between the oil pan and the subframe.  I'm not sure what the intent is, as the upper mount doesn't actually appear to support the engine.  Nonetheless, I put a put a piece of plywood under the oil pan and use a floor jack to lift the engine just a bit.  It also appears that you can use a tool or a piece of board in place of the wedge.

Loosen the two hose clamps on the rubber duct between the air mass meter and the intake pipe (see notation at lower right side of pic below for location).

Remove the upper mount.

Now you can see the belt, pulleys and tensioner.

The tensioner is at the rear.

There's a shallow square hole in the top of the tensioner body - you insert a 1/2" drive ratchet extension into it and use that as a lever to pull the tensioner forward to release tension on the belt.

A solid 12" to 18" extension works best.  You can make up from a couple of smaller sections but that will flex more; still, it should get the job done.  There's a small hole in the front face of the tensioner that lines up with another hole in the body of the tensioner - you pull the ratchet extension forward and then insert a 3 mm hex/Allen wrench or suitable rod into the two holes when they line up.  Now release tension on the pull-bar and the hex wrench will hold the tensioner in the compressed position.  The manual says to be careful not to damage the tensioner at the end of its travel - dunno what that means, although I assume it means that if you allow the tensioner to release all the way (as in, fail to put the hex wrench in the hole to hold it compressed), the tensioner will be damaged.

So now the belt is slack and can be removed.  You'll have to twist it flat a bit to get it between some of the pulleys and the car body.  Remove it and inspect it for damage.  The manual says to replace it every 60 K miles.  Here's a pic of mine after it supposedly had only 30 K miles on it:

If this belt really only has 30 K miles on it, then I would replace the belt every 30 K miles, not every 60 K miles. Admittedly, it's only got minor cracking, but I'd rather not see any cracking at all.  If the belt or a pulley fails, you are STRANDED - no water pump.  Remember that!

You should also inspect the pulleys carefully.  Remember all the warnings at the start of this write-up.

Pulley removals

Rear pulley removal is simple - it's easily accessed with a 15 mm box-end wrench.  When installing the new one, torque the bolt to 35 ft-lbs.  As I recall there is a flat spacer washer behind the pulley.

Middle pulley removal isn't too bad, but installing it is a real test of dexterity.  Remove the bolt with a 13 mm box-end or open-end wrench - may be tight and you might have to hit the wrench with something to break it loose.  I forget just what sort of washers there are - just pay attention when removing it.  The problem with installation is getting things in place and holding them while you get the bolt started, without dropping anything - it's really cramped and it's quite a challenge.  The only suggestion I have is keep at it until you get it.

The tensioner pulley is worse yet because it uses a 6 mm hex/Allen wrench for the bolt and there's not enough room to get a standard hex/Allen wrench between the body and the bolt.  The solution is to remove the whole tensioner assembly.  You can get an 8 mm hex/Allen wrench on that bolt.  You'll probably need to use a cheater pipe to get enough break-away torque.  Space is limited and it's tedious, but you can eventually get the bolt out.  Remove the tensioner assembly, then remove the pulley bolt. 

Be careful, as the recess for the wrench in the bolt is pretty shallow and it's easy to round it out.  Replace the pulley.  If you're a dumb-ass like me, you'll re-use the original bolt instead of using the new, regular-head bolt supplied in the pulley kit ... it's a lot easier to remove the tensioner pulley with a standard bolt head, so by all means use it.  Reinstall the tensioner assembly.  The torque spec for the pulleys is 35 ft-lbs.

Install the new belt

The belt goes over the steering pump pulley at the top front and the small idler pulley at the top rear, pulling down to contact the bottom of the middle idler pulley (the smooth side of the belt rides on this pulley).  At the rear it goes down and around the alternator pulley, back straight up over the tensioner pulley, then down around the crank pulley.  At the front it goes down around the AC pulley, back up around the water pump pulley (smooth side of the belt), then down to the crank pulley.  It's challenging to get it all in place without slipping off - they don't call it serpentine for nuthin'.  When it's in place, fit the 1/2" socket extension into the tensioner, pull toward the front of the car slightly, pull the 3mm retainer tool out f the hole and slowly let the tensioner pull back to take up the slack in the belt.  Check the position on all the pulleys.  When you're satisfied that it's in place, start the engine, then turn it off and check the belt again.  If it's OK, start and run for a few more seconds.  If the belt looks like it's running properly, you can proceed.  Be sure that it isn't hagning off the edge of any pulleys, as that will shred a belt pretty quickly.  Yup, I did it once on a 9000.

Finish up

Refit the upper mount,  Tighten the four bolts to 35 ft-lbs.  Refit the 17 mm nut loosely and push the engine back and forth to let it find its position, then tighten the nut to 78 ft-lbs.  Lower the jack from under the pan or knock out the wedge.

Re-install the bottom splash panel.  Fitting it is a puzzle - I can't remember exactly how to do it, but I took the picture below.

When it's in place, secure it with the three 7 mm screws at the front, underneath.

Fit the wheel well liner

Refit the wheel and torque the bolts to 80 ft-lbs.  The manual says to do this without weight on the wheels, but I don't know how the hell you're supposed to do that!  Lower the car enough to put some weight on the wheel, then torque the bolts.

Remove the jack stands, lower the car and test drive.  It's very difficult to see the belt on the pulleys with the upper mount installed, but do a final visual check as best you can.