1999 Dodge Grand Caravan SE from North America - Comments

I have a 3.3L 1995 Plymouth Grand Voyager with a classic serpentine belt & tensioner pulley problem. I observed the belt was running on the outside edge the pulley, and when viewed from the top of the engine, the pulley assembly was tilted outward, forcing the serpentine belt out of alignment. The belt squealed all the time, and even more so when it was wet.

My fix:

1) The serpentine belts must be loosened to free the tensioner pulley assembly

2) From under the engine, loosen the single nut that holds the tensioner pulley assembly in place. Leaving enough slack to allow a shim to be inserted between the engine bracket and the lower portion of the pulley tensioner spring assembly

3) Make a metal shim about 3/16 inch thick and 2.5 inch long by .5 inch wide. I made my shim from from a metal flat L corner bracket purchase from the hardware section at a Lowes store. I filed the metal bracket down to make it the proper thickness. I installed it. Ran the engine. The tensioner was aligned and the belt was properly aligned on the pulley.

I just put 3000 miles on the vehicle and all was good. I hope this helps... The side walk mechanic.

I hope this will be my last car bought from these guys. Chrysler Town&Country LXi 97.I paid the dealer 550$ a year ago to make the belt to stay on. They replaced the belt after 2 wks because of the noise telling me that only the second time the replacement it's free. :) ) ) ) ) Don't ever ever buy a car like this again.

The noise was still on for the last year. I feel like I like it now. I think is great and it should be advertise with this cars.

I'll try GATES Part # 38379K this week as the last chance.

I am an attorney and I have just finished spending hours on the telephone with Chrysler, regarding the now-familiar belt problem on my 1999 Dodge Caravan Sport.

The first round of calls was with a customer service representative and multiple supervisors in India. They offered that since the car was out of warranty, there was nothing Chrysler could do. I stressed that the problem is a dangerous design defect, not a warranty matter, but they stuck to their position. After I insisted on talking to someone in the Chrysler corporate headquarters in Michigan, I was transferred to a "senior staff" member. She repeated the warranty line, and hung up on me when I did not answer a question to her liking.

I then scoured the Internet for a means to contact top Chrysler officials in Michigan, but they are well insulated. I called Chrysler customer service in India again, and was told that they do not have a telephone number for Chrysler corporate headquarters; they could only transfer me.

I talked to another "senior staff" member and her supervisor, who both told me to refer to state "lemon law" for any relief. The supervisor refused to let me speak to anyone above her.

I am trying to warn everyone about the dangerous design defects of the Dodge Caravan in order to prevent needless bodily injuries and deaths resulting from belt malfunctions which cause the power steering and cooling systems to immediately quit. Please join with me in notifying every authority you can about the hazards to human health and safety posed by the Dodge Caravan, so that it will be recalled immediately.

Great... I still hope I just got a great deal on a very clean 1999 3.3L Dodge Grand Caravan, SE... with the fix I am seeing here on your site... the Gates Part #38379. I bought the car yesterday. The prior owner reports few problems, other than the noisy belt which just began its tirade. I just went to your site here to see what I could do to fix the problem the rest of you are reporting, and uh oh. This will be my wife's car to commute to work. Now I am like, Oh crap... here we go with car repairs. I'm going to give this part a chance and post back with what I hope is still some pleasure in my purchase. I really feel sorry for you folks prior to the Gates fix. Good luck and wish my knuckles luck as well.

I have a 97 dodge caravan. I have replaced the belt and pulleys so many times I can't count. I cannot believe Chrystler has not made an attempt to fix this problem. I have 4 children, and I'm scared to drive my van anywhere. I have put so much money in to this van replacing these parts, and it is so frustrating to have the belt come off repeatedly. When I called the dealership they act like they have never heard of this problem, BULL CRAP!!! They will wait for someone to get killed before they address it.

Macon, Ga.

I'm on the same Van (wagon) as most of the above, I replaced my old cracked belt, the very next day it rained, the belt came off right away. It was near my home so I manage to gimp to the driveway with plenty of strength and low battery. I was guessing the belt was installed improperly, called the mechanic, he went and put the belt on again, he triple checked it was aligned, ran the van some minutes without problems, then the very next day I drove thru a puddle and the belt came off again, lucky enough a few blocks from home and again gimped back to the driveway.

We figured it was because of wet conditions, we did the water test and it came off immediately, we saw that the tensioner pulley was all flat and it was slipping from there.

After 3 or 4 trips to the autoparts store, who didn't know of this problem, we tried several different pulleys from other manufacturers, it seems all the Chrysler ones were also flat.

We noticed the idler pulley wasn't flat, but had the retaining lips, we bought that one for $10, had to change the bearing core to match the tensioner and reduced the inside casing maybe 1mm.

So far so good, but having to do all this work for a design flaw is very annoying and dangerous if you are in the middle of the freeway and lose a belt, Chrysler should issue a recall and send kits for free to the customers that bought these vans..

I have also been plagued with the belt problem on my 1998 Caravan with the 3.0L. I just found the Gates "refit" kit (Part #38342K) at a local O'Reilly's Auto after searching the Internet for answers. I've had this van since it was new, and have replaced the belt more times than I can possibly remember.

This kit from Gates replaces the idler pulley & tensioner pulley with grooved ones, not the smooth factory style. And it comes with a belts that has grooves on both sides. I just got it today for $146.99. I can't wait install it tonight after work. After all the belts I've replaced, this will be a small price to pay if it solves my problem once and for all.

I completely agree that Chrysler should own up to this problem, and do something about it!!!

I feel kind of silly writing this, as I have a 2000 Caravan Sport with the 3.3 liter flex fuel engine, and with just a few miles shy of 197,000 miles.

I'm the original owner. I do most repair things myself if it's something I'm comfortable with.

The belt has been replaced about 3 times over the years.

At 70,000 miles when a transmission speed sensor went out. The dealer said the idler pulley bearing was noisy and they replaced it along with a new belt.

At 124,000 miles the water pump started dripping, so I replaced it myself along with a new belt. That's when I found out how hard it was to compress the tensioner and put the belt on by yourself. I made a tool for it and carry it with me in the car, along with my normal tools and a spare belt.

At about 150,000 miles a slight leak in the power steering pump became a gusher. I took it to the dealer as it looked like too many things had to come off for me to attempt it. The mechanic said he had to pull the wheel and right axle half-shaft to install the new pump.

The reason I visited this site is that I started hearing a little bearing rattle from one of the idler pulleys, and was searching the Internet for a source for a new pulley. I found it hard to believe that so many were having problems with the serpentine belts coming off, especially in a wet situation.

I wash my engine regularly and hose it off. I then run it so it will dry more quickly. I've never had a problem with the belt attempting to slip off a pulley. I'm a pretty fair engineer and looked closely at the system. I'm now doing this from memory, but I only recall the 2 idler pulleys and a larger one under the AC pulley clutch assembly that were smooth without flanges. All the other pulleys were grooved with side flanges, including the alternator.

It is very difficult to try and bend the belt sideways, even just holding the belt in your hands. The runs of the belt from a grooved flanged pulley to a smooth pulley are short enough that there shouldn't be any tendency to want to drift sideways.

There are only two things that would cause the belt to want to drift. One would be that all the pulleys aren't in the same exact plane, putting side pressure on the belt. The other would be one of the accessories was loose and the belt tension caused the shaft and pulley to tilt a bit and the belt to want to walk sideways. If the belt was caused to have to bend a bit sideways in its run, it would cause early failure of the belt along with a tendency to come off. Of course, if the tensioner was broken or weak the belt would also have tendency to ride off the pulleys.

I always use a spray belt dressing at my oil changes, mostly to extend belt life.

The only real problem with the car is the transmission speed sensors (both input and output) tend to have a short lifespan. I have a code reader and changed them twice myself.

The transmission is original and works perfectly except for when a speed sensor goes bad and it goes into "limp mode". Transmission fluid and filter are changed every 30,000 miles. Engine oil (Syntec 10/40 + Prolong additive) every 6000 to 7000 miles keeps the engine going strong with less than a cup of oil used in that time period.

All in all, I've been happy with the car. Sorry about all your problems. My best advice would be to get a rigid, narrow straight edge and check the pulley alignment from pulley to pulley. I think that's where the problem lies, and it certainly may be from poor assembly from Dodge. It could also be from aftermarket accessories like alternators, water pumps, etc. that don't have the same dimensions as original parts.

By the way, I'm a 67 year old optometrist.

John in Lake Havasu AZ.

5 months later and running great! Thanks to the Gates pulley. I posted a comment on July 23, 2008. Check it out... same problem as the rest of you... however, the Gates part, pulley, I used as a replacement on the 99 Dodge Grand Caravan. It is getting the job done. It is November 25 now... my wife is using this car everyday, a 50 mile commute. I feel safe with her in the car now the fix is done. Everybody, quit horsing around on this one. Get the Gates pulley... the belt doesn't spin off of it... at least it hasn't mine. My worst headache was getting grit under my contact lens working on it... which cost me a scratch on my eye. Let a mechanic do it, and drive off knowing you don't have to return to this website again for help. If you guys decide to do a class action suit, let me know. Maybe I'll buy some safety goggles so I don't act stupid with my eyes again. Good luck.

2000 Dodge Grand Caravan Sport AWD 3.8L

Just had the tensioner and belt replaced, came off during wet conditions as usual. I did find a tensioner that was redesigned by Dayco, it's model 251. Dodge now uses this design in their newer year 3.3L and 3.8L engines. They designed the tensioner with a slight offset to keep the belt from jumping off.

I purchased the tensioner from Autozone for

$42 and the Goodyear Gator belt for $34. Had both installed at Pep Boys for $107. Make sure you request the Dayco tensioner since there are still Korean tensioners being sold built to the old OE specs and they will fail eventually.

I have driven through the deepest puddles I could find and can't get the belt to jump off. Now if I could just get the transmission to stop leaking, the power window motors replaced, the AC unit repaired and the roof to stop leaking it would be a nice van... LOL

The only reason I still have it is because of the all wheel drive, that works great... knock on wood.

Belt slipping off? One shredded, two popped off.

Will be putting the old belt on, then getting one of the kits. From what I have seen, Gates and Advanced Auto both offer kits for the 3.8l (which is what I have). I also found that NAPA offers a kit, but it is twice as much as the gates kit.

We'll be in touch after the repair!!

Thanks to all for your comments. We have 99 Town & Country van, replaced the belt about 4 times, along with water pump, crankshaft damper, 130k. Thanks for the info about the gates kit. Hope to try it soon.

I was driving my family on Christmas Eve (2008) in our 2000 Dodge Caravan Sport version with the 3.3 liter engine when we went through a deep puddle and the battery indicator light came on with the bell alarm, and then the alternator light came on. Then I noticed the car was harder to steer and the brakes required much more effort.

With luck I made it back home after about a mile, but the van was getting pretty hot. I realized it had to be the serpentine belt, and sure enough it fell off.

That night I did some research on here and found out about the Gates conversion kit. I had the car towed the day after Christmas to a NAPA repair shop nearby and had to explain to them about the kit. They told me they had replaced a lot of the belts on the Caravans that had fallen off, but never realized this kit was available. I had them install the Gates conversion kit for the 3.3L engine. I could not believe how quiet my engine sounded after they installed it, and I could swear the power steering worked better after they changed the belt and pulleys. I have gone through puddles and snow without any problems so far and feel I can trust this van again. It has only 84,000 miles on it but this would be the third belt and tensioner. I will update again in a few months.

After reading about this online for the last year or so, I'm convinced that this happens because the person who replaces the belt does not align it correctly. The first time I needed a new belt, it was replaced by the guy who was replacing my transmission. So I didn't care so much about paying the hundred bucks or so for the new belt. Also, I got lucky, as I was able to drive the van through all weather for the next three years without incident. However, once I replaced the timing belt, and replaced the serpentine while doing the job, I began to have the problem of the belt slipping off. While it's apparent to me that it's "user error" in the lack of gaining a perfect alignment at installation, I also agree that Chrysler should be replacing these "bald" pulleys with pulleys that have a "lip" to better hold the belt in place whether it's perfectly aligned or not.

I just did the gates conversion after having been afraid to drive in the rain for the last month. A couple of tips for anyone who's gonna do this themselves.

First, there are two ways to do this. You can either replace the ENTIRE tensioner/pulley mechanism, which requires getting up under the car to get at the nut that holds the tensioner in place, OR you can simply remove the pulley from the tensioner and replace it with the slotted pulley that's attached to the new tensioner. I went with the 2nd option. So I still have the original tensioner on the van, and I have a brand new one as a backup if or when the original ever fails.

A third way, that I thought of as I was finishing up the job, might be to skip the conversion kit altogether! Simply go to a u-pull-it junkyard, and replace your 'bald' tensioner pulley with the standard idler pulley. If you notice, when you take your two pulleys off to do the conversion, the idler pulley actually has a little lip along the edge, to keep the belt in place. Aside from that, it's the exact same pulley as the pulley on the tensioner, which does NOT have this lip. Why didn't they use the same "lipped" pulley for both idler and tensioner?!!

Now, I went to get an idler pulley from autozone a while back. It does NOT have this lip. So it's not as simple as going to the parts store to get it. You'll probably have to go to a junkyard and pull one of the idler pulleys with a lip off another car. Your cost should be no more than 5 bucks, versus 150 for the gates kit. If I wasn't half-way done by the time I noticed this, I probably would have gone this route myself. For that matter, I still have the receipt for the gates kit. So I still may...

I just converted to the Gates dual sided micro-v belt this week, as my belt broke just the other day. Luckily I was parked at home and it broke upon starting my van in the morning.

Some words of advice. Shop around for the best price on replacement parts. As well, I found that an extra bushing was needed for the grooved idler pulley, that did not come with the pulley itself. However, it was part of a new smooth tension-er pulley. So I had to parts swap a bit. hope it all works out!