[Outdated, please look at pinned post] Casual Conversation

That's a major success and you should be super proud of yourself! You saved a ton of $$ and learned something new - total win-win!

Sounds like your car did not defeat you, and like you kicked a lot of ass. Serpentine belts are a giant pain in the ass - fought with one myself today. Just gotta have the right tool, which in this case is one of those that gets used once every 5 years unless you work on a lot of cars. You did great, and should be proud of what you accomplished!

Listen, I took autoship in highschool, my dad talked me into doing an engine swap on his 1969 Volvo and got me to do all kinds of maintenance on his 1955 Chevy pickup truck, all before I turned 18. Out of highschool I got a job in a shop that specialized in Mazda rotary engines. I have worked on so many cars for money and as a favor for friends and I can tell you I have been similarly defeated so many times by similar simple things. It happens to everybody sooner or later, even guys with giant toolboxes and years of experience. Sometimes you just need help, and that's ok.

I'm proud of you, cuz I know how these kinds of jobs can be, and how exhausting it is just getting hard to reach bolts undone. You're not a failure, you are great. Bongo Stryker says so.

In some cars you really just need an extra set of hands to get a belt back on. One person on the tensioner and another actually moving the belt into place. Don't feel bad, feel good. You did great.

Props on getting so much done!

trying to force the belt tensioner back took every ounce of strength I could muster.

You need a breaker bar. Already have one? You need a breaker bar and a pipe 😀

Good job! Sounds like it was your first time and things generally well.

This weekend a patched a hole in drywall for the first time and i feel like i did a pretty good job!

Congrats on saving $800! Sure you had to bust your ass and in the end pay whatever task rabbit is - what, a 1-hour minimum for under a further $100. Take that $700 you didn't need to spend on car repairs, and and if you have it, save it. If you don't have it, think of all that credit interest you don't have to pay. And go order yourself a pizza.

Replacing the alternator can be either the easiest or most difficult task ever, depending on the car. But if it's a Chrysler/Jeep/Dodge, it'll always be difficult because they hate their customers.

In theory, it should always be easy. Loosen the tensioner, pop off the belt, unscrew a few things, remove a couple wires, pop it out, and perform the steps in reverse. But sometimes it gets stuck or the manufacturer requires you to practically take half the car apart to get to it.

What might help is getting a second set of hands. Sometimes it just takes one person putting the belt on while the other is holding the tensioner back.

You likely just need a longer breaker bar to give yourself more leverage on the tensioner.

You got further than I've ever gotten trying to fix anything car-related. Good job! I feel like technology's in such a complicated place at this point that nobody's expected to be able to handle every single step of every situation on their own. You did awesome.

As someone who works on vehicles a lot, not a profesional mechanic but have a couple older vehicles that I've been repairing and modifying including rebuilding the engine in one so far, I can say getting belts to cooperate and go where they're suppose to is often one of the most difficult and frustrating parts of repairs. There's most of the time very little room to get to where you need to and the belts are tight even when they have as much slack as possible. This weekend I replaced a timing belt, water pump, motor mount, and serpentine belt on my fiance's car and ignition coil packs, and dropped a gas tank to replace a fuel pump on a coworker's truck. When I was putting the serpentine belt on my fiance's car I got frustrated with it and moved on to something else for a little bit and then when I had nothing else except the belt and reattaching stuff that would be in the way of the belt, I went back to fighting with it. Especially for doing your first vehicle repairs you're likely missing tools that would make the job way easier so you're essentially doing the job on hard mode so getting as far as you have is still a major accomplishment. Some advice though, before you get the belt on go back over all the bolts and try to make sure they're as tight as you can get them. Without having a torque wrench to make sure they're as tight as they're suppose to be it's difficult to tell if they're fully tight especially if you've been fighting with it and are physically worn out at the time. I've had times where I tightened bolts as much as I could but was so exhausted I didn't have the strength to get them tight enough but didn't realize it at the time.

There's a belt tensioner tool that can be rented from the auto parts store. This helps greatly to pull back the belt pulley to get a belt on. Had to do it once and having that tool made a big difference.

This is how it starts. Soon, you'll start putting together a small collection of tools, and more knowledge about how the car is put together, and you will be driving a perfectly maintained and operational car that has a ton of miles on it, and it won't give you any trouble - or at least, it won't give you trouble you can't solve.

Dude, I'm super proud of you! Tackling something like that with almost zero experience is fucking awesome, and the fact that you almost completely fnished it by yourself--100% solo, no less--is bad ass as hell.

I get it. Do all that work, and at the end, it's still not working? Ugh, that's the worst :( I always feel super defeated in that sort of circumstance.

OTOH...I have to echo the others giving you a virtual pat on the back. You were super stretching your DIY skills! Kudos for going for it! That's not an easy thing to do, and it sounds like you got through 99% of the job. That's def something where you can be proud of yourself.

If the only thing wrong after your first DIY repair job is a belt, yoy DID do a good job. What you experienced was quite normal, and you have now gained experience for the future.

You got pretty damn far. Those tensioners can be a bitch, I usually call a buddy whenever I have to muck with one because it's easier to manipulate either the tensioner or the belt. Good job!

Something I learned as I got a little bit older. It's worth paying for things to save yourself the pain in the ass. I trade a dude weed to mow my lawn.

Good for you for even trying!! I'm a middle-aged man and I am an avid handyman, even though I have an office job as a profession. Like you, it started because I didn't want to pay someone else (I'm cheap that way). These days I am very adept at woodworking, carpentry, electrical, plumbing, felling trees, some car repair, and more. The way I look at it is "if THAT person can do it, so can I!".

You didn't fail today, simply for the reason that you attempted to do it. Don't stop there! Your confidence and your finances will thank you down the road.

Hate to be that person, but usually you leave the alternator loose before putting the belt on. Or force it on by sliding it with a screwdriver. I don’t know your particular car so I could be wrong.

experience gained is priceless

With car stuff it's always "easy" in basic steps but it's the knowledge and expertise how to handle all the exceptions to the process that is why labour costs what it does.

There's tips and tricks for different car models but stuff like what to deal with a stuck bolt where even if I know what to do I probably don't have the right tools.

I'm not sure getting the tools is worth the once every few years job.

It's not too dissimilar from electronics work. Like laptop or cellphone repair. It's easy... But what's hard is troubleshooting when it all goes sideways on you.

You should be so proud of yourself! That's a major accomplishment doing the research and figuring it out yourself.

I would make sure those bolts you put back in are torqued to spec or that alternator could come loose in the future

Sure doesn't sound like a failure to me. Sounds like someone who was able to put in the work and the time and saved a bunch of money!

Looks like you could have done it with a little leverage. Im sure the belt tensioner would have been tough to move as well. Spend that money on better tools. A big breaker bar seems to be a good start. Proper tools make everything easier. Welcome to the ill fix this shit myself club!

I've been there, I once replaced the alternator on my dad's truck took like five minutes. Well, I was driving a 2002 ford focus and needed to replace the alternator on that. I did one before, should be easy right? That SOB fought me for 6 hours. They put that damn thing in such an inconvenient spot, to where I had to loosen up the engine mounts move the whole engine enough to squeeze it out. Still loved that little car even if it was a pain in the ass.

That's impressive stuff. My brothers replaced alternator belt a few days ago and the trick to put the belt on was to put the belt on the engine spool, and crank the engine to let it do the rest of the job. The difference though is that this car did not have a tensioner.

Way to go! You weren’t defeated, you did the whole job you were able to. You can get a short length of pipe that will slide over your wrench handle to give you extra leverage in cases like this.

I worked as a service writer in a shop full of mechanics (all men) and they all had a breaker bar wrench for these situations.

Also, if you’ve got the DIY bug now and you take on more projects find a store (Harbor Freight is good if in the US) that sells cheap tools, buy them there and if you use it enough to break it, then go buy the more expensive/better made version.

Saves from spending lots on a tool you rarely use.

That’s effing awesome! I’m stereotypically someone that would look like I could do that in my sleep (male, lots of tools in my garage) and I definitely would have taken it somewhere to get changed. I don’t even know you and I’m proud af of you!

I'm going to be an outlier in my comment here but, for myself (an elderly dude who has done what you just did) I, personally, prefer to hire it done. You paid 2-3 hundred on parts and tools, put in 10+ hours of work and still have not got it working. I have come to appreciate the skill and ability of trades...they do that for a living - let them.

I'm really good at my chosen trade and I laugh at those that think they can just do my job because the watched a YouTube video about it. I fix their problems every day and charge them no more than someone who didn't fuck it up first because I can appreciate the effort but I don't charge them less because they did part of the work incorrectly.

Thats one for the book of wins

Sounds like you learned a lot. As far as the belt tensioner and not being able to budge it, usually stuff like that is a matter of leverage. You probably just need a breaker bar. Those are basically a longer version of a ratchet and are very useful for tight bolts. Usually they are pretty cheap too.

Hey, you did more with your car than I, a Y-chromosome-haver, could have ever done. I'm impressed! I couldn't change the oil in my car, let alone the alternator.

As for my weekend (no one else answered, but what the hell), it was sort of bittersweet. My mom is 81 and lives about an 75-minute drive away, so I only get to see her once or twice a month for a couple of hours, but I was actually able to spend about six hours with her on Saturday. We had a long chat, then my daughter got antsy, so we all went to the beautiful new library branch and then she dropped us off at the local mall and we all said goodbye. It was really nice, even though I know there won't be too many of those nice times left. Then I got to show my daughter A Hard Day's Night and Airplane! on Sunday and Monday. So that was pretty fun.