hi all,

 

Quick question, hoping someone has a clue here, as Continental is not answering my query:
On the 1.8T motor I'm replacing the alternator, tensioner and belt. The serpentine belt is double sided, but my new belt looks like rubber on one side (with colorful sparklies!) and the other side looks like a kind of cloth. Grooves are otherwise the same, so which side faces the drive wheel/steering pump/alternator and which side faces the A/C unit!? I'm stumped, since I took the old belt of without looking first... Continental's online documentation is wildly technical with graphs up the kazoo, but seems to be missing this critical detail. Guidance is much appreciated.

The grooved side runs on the grooved pulleys, crankshaft, alternator & aircon, the tensioner pulley is smooth & contacts the other (smooth) side of the belt, cant recall if there is a waterpump or idler pulley but the same applies.

This belt is double-sided: same grooves both sides, yet the material is different. Maybe it makes no difference, but my reasoning is there must be some intention to this design, and the only wheels that receive the "back" of the belt (yet to be determined) are the tensioner (smooth as you say) and the A/C, which has grooves! Stumped.

Strange that its double sided but I suppose it stops someone putting it on the wrong way.

 

Regarding it running on the opposite side of the belt on the aircon pulley I think you are mistakenly running the belt through the wrong path, been there & done that on the MK1 albeit with a diesel engine, it looked the obvious and to me the only path, like you I had not looked carefully before removing but the tensioner would not operate.

 

Its all a bit of a dim memory and I cant visualise it, probably just as well that I didn't have a double sided belt as well!

Thanks, but I've checked on a diagram and about 99.9% certain it runs this way. The belt would not fit any other way. Double sided explains perfectly why the "back" is running the A/C, and has grooves both sides. This is the 1.8T (year 2000).

At this point, I'm about ready to cut the thing in half, glue it back together as a Möbius strip, and call it a day. 😉

Thingy with the triangle is the A/C

Oh actually maybe power steering pump, but it matters not: you can see from the diagram that the belt drives from both sides.

Ok that makes sense, different from my diesel, I had not realised that both your old and new belts were double sided.

UPDATE: Finally got an answer from Conti regarding the installation of this belt. All they did was send me a link to a video (in German) addressing precisely this topic, so they must be aware that many people are confused. Don't know why they don't write in in 27 languages on the package. In the video, the guy says he "pulls the belt immediately out of the packaging and turns it around a few times, and then doesn't know which way it came, which is EXACTLY what I did! They know!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uaRbcWb6Yo

I had to copy-paste the German closed captions into Google translate, but was able to determine the answer:

The "webbed" side of the belt (the woven cloth side) rides towards the alternator pully. (That's how I ended up installing it anyway, so saves me the trouble of turning it around).

Hope this is useful to future seekers. Cheers.

or they could print an arrow and just "Inside" on the sides of the belt..