Soft Bumpy Serpentine Belt

[JHZR2]

My 98 S-10 doesn’t get a ton of use, and had sat all winter. Took it out today, and the belt/pullies are making some noise. Need to investigate from where, later.

What surprised me was that the belt was pretty hot and soft, and had small bumps on it. It was admittedly very grippy

Running the engine, looking under the hood doesn’t show anything obvious. Everything works fine including the AC. Anyone else ever notice that their belt looks like this? I’d suspect this is about 5 years old and a few thousand miles.

I never use dressing or oils and nothing leaks. It just fees a lot softer than I’m used to/I recall from this belt.

 

[AutoMechanic]

Never seen one look like that. Most of the ones I’ve seen wear by stitching coming apart or cracking. I have seen them get lines in them too when wearing down. What noise it is making? Squeak/chirp?

 

[oggb]

Something that runs on the smooth side of the belt isn't happy. That's what is giving you that smeared and striated appearance on the smooth side.

 

[slacktide_bitog]

Have you ever replaced any of the tensioners and pulleys?

The water pump? Or anything else driven by the belt? Have you replaced anything recently? The good news is that all the OE parts are still available if you need to replace anything

 

[JimPghPA]

Something that runs on the smooth side of the belt isn't happy. That's what is giving you that smeared and striated appearance on the smooth side.

+1 on that. Is the idler smooth? You might start by removing the belt and manually turning each of the smooth pullies while looking for one that does not turn well because of a bad bearing.

 

[Chris142]

The top pic is what a belt looks like when there is a piece of sand stuck in a groove in a pulley.

 

[Electromotive]

My 98 S-10 doesn’t get a ton of use, and had sat all winter. Took it out today, and the belt/pullies are making some noise. Need to investigate from where, later.

What surprised me was that the belt was pretty hot and soft, and had small bumps on it. It was admittedly very grippy

Running the engine, looking under the hood doesn’t show anything obvious. Everything works fine including the AC. Anyone else ever notice that their belt looks like this? I’d suspect this is about 5 years old and a few thousand miles.

I never use dressing or oils and nothing leaks. It just fees a lot softer than I’m used to/I recall from this belt.

View attachment 54819View attachment 54820View attachment 54821

Had this exact thing on my 03 Accord with a new Dayco belt The bumps started showing after about 40,000 or so miles. No weird noises from pulleys or anything else I could pin point. The belt grooves looked perfectly normal. Ran it another 8,000 miles or so and put a new Bando brand belt on. Bando belt looks normal so far after approx. 15,000 miles. Dayco is in trunk for a spare.

 

[zzyzzx]

Something that runs on the smooth side of the belt isn't happy. That's what is giving you that smeared and striated appearance on the smooth side.

Rust on the smooth side from sitting?