I have been noticing whistle/howling wind noise coming from the pulleys area for the last 2 days. Didn't think too much of it, figured it's probably the belt tensioner or one of the pulley, I'll just take it in maybe during the weekend to have a look.

Coming home tonight I heard a loud squeak, lost power steering and battery light went on. The Brake warning light also came on (anybody know why?). Luckily I wasn't that far away from home. Drove the car back home without power steering. This is the first time I've ever driven a car without power steering, so it was quiet an experience.

Pop the hood after I got home, notice the belt is quite lose. The belt itself didn't look damaged. Shine a flashlight down and there is it, the idler pulley resting peacefully on undercarriage cover.

FYI it's the #7 pulley in the diagram below:

 

Wow. Snap some pics.

 

Did the bolt break or back out?

 

wow. mine has been sqealing for weeks... I should probably do something about it.

 

Picked this guy up from the bottom with a magnet stick. The bolt was not broken.

 

Is the bearing seized?

 

Not seized but it sure doesn't rotate very smoothly.

 

ok seized-ish then

 

How many miles on the car? I'd say at 60K (2nd belt replacement?) is a good time to replace the tensioner pulley along with the idlers (3 of them).

 

Car has a little over 100K miles. Took the car in today, the shop saids the tensioner is a little weak also, so I told them to replace the tensioner as well.

I didn't replace the original belt until like 90K. It still looked like it has plenty of life left. Fortunately my new belt didn't get damaged last night.

 

on the 1st gen g35s we would take the idler pully off and use a shorter belt but by the looks of all the pullies it may be tough to do that for #7, you could take off #4 no prob

Thanks for reminding me to change my belt I have 96k on mine and it's squeaking a little in the cold

 

OP: On my 96 Maxima, brake and battery lights together means the alternator isn't charging. I'd assume the same is true on these cars.

 

Well the alternator (it charges the battery) wont work if the belt isn't connected to it. So that's probably why all the lights came on. Like the guy said and that's what I've seen it do in my 96 Maxima as well.

 

This literally just happened to me this morning on my way to work...found out my insurance doesnt cover roadside assistance. Luckily a shop in town was able to assist me. Now just gotta wait till its repaired.

Why am i noticing a trend with issues with our cars? I recently had issues with the ac coolant hose falling apart and leaking all over my engine.

maybe Infiniti needs to be aware because this is inconvenient 🙄

 

Infiniti builds to a price point like every other manufacturer. With enough bad press, they will reduce their profit margin to increase the intangible asset "customer satisfaction".