Air compressor belt adjustment bolt problems

[roqz]

Hi,

I have a 4 door 1991 Suzuki Sidekick, recently one of the belts was squeaking every time I did hard turns to either side.

When I was coming home from lunch, the steering was very hard, like my father's old and non-hydraulics's 1975 Jeep CJ5.

So today I checked that the steering pump and air compressor belt was kind of loosen, so that every time I was steering, the steering pump stopped its rotation.

So I proceeded to tight that belt by loosening the air conditioning bolt from its slot bracket. To my surprise, when I tried to tight it again... I couldn't!

Worse was that I can't loose it to the end either! So now my car has a not so tight yet not so loose air compressor adjustment bolt.

The good part was that after tightening the belt the squeaking stopped and the steering was again fluid and soft as it should be.

The awful part is that I can't drive the car anymore as the bolt is just at the most tight position it allowed me, but a single rotation more will put it to the loosest point... I don't know how this is called in english (And by the way, sorry for my bad mechanics lingo, I'm a computer science engineer from Costa Rica). We call it "transroscado", that is, a screw that doesn't tighten or loosen but keeps rotating.

I noticed that there is a very flat screw head to the other end that is also rotating in tandem with the bolt, but I can't hold it in any way.

I have a Chilton manual (66500) for this car series, but it isn't helpful at all... Not even a single picture of the compressor.

I supposed that just tightening it would be a solution, but now I think I have a bigger problem.

I'm attaching a file, the red circled bolt is the one I thought that would solve my problems, the green circle is around the flat screw head that I can't make to stop rotating... The blue arrow points to a hidden part that I don't know if it is a bolt or part of the bracket... I doesn't rotate but looks like a bolt.

I would appreciate any help on this, particularly if there is a trick to grab the flat screw head.

[kevinstracker]

Hello. You seem to have too many parts. Actually, your red bolt threads in to the compressor body to tighten it up on the arm with the slot. Something is stripped if it just keeps turning--either bolt or hole. It is going to be the hole because it is aluminum and the bolt is steel. You will have to go up to the next size bolt diameter and likely retap the hole. You can back the bolt out by forcing a flat blade screwdriver under the head and turning the bolt left. It should come out. Get a new belt when you put this back together. Good luck

[Nor'Easter]

You may want to go with a thread insert rather than using a larger bolt. They come in a kit and they look like a small coil spring. You drill and tap the aluminum, thread the insert in, break the installation `tab`, then reuse the same sized (new) bolt as original.

[savwafare10]

I had the same issue.I used a exhaust stud to fix mine. It had fine thread on one end and the same thread as bolt on the other. I double nuted the stud fine thread into the compressor. A flat washer and a lock washer and so far so good. A larger bolt would not fit through the slot on the brackit. My next fix would be to file a nut thin enough to fit between the tang and the compressor manifold. Other than this kind of fix, would have to be remove( not disconnect the lines) the compressor and install a heli coil. Hope this can help in some way.