TECH-TIP

Blower Belt Drive Tension

Effects: All Air Cubs
Purpose: Provide specifications and procedures for correct blower belt alignment and tension.

WARNING
Before performing any check or adjustments, be sure the equipment can not start without your knowledge.
Severe body injury or death can result.
Disconnect negative terminal on the batteries. Always use proper lock out / tag out procedures.

MISALIGNED PULLEY

Parallel offset, angled Angular misalignment,

FIGURE 1 pulley or shaft. FIGURE 2 offset pulley or shaft. FIGURE 3 CORRECT

Inspection: Before adjusting the belt tension make sure FIGURE 4

TENSION
TESTER
that the Pulleys (sheaves) are in good condition and are
mounted correctly. Inspect for damage. Pulleys with
cracks or other unsafe defects should be replaced. Small
nicks and burrs may be filed smooth. Use a groove gage
to check wear. Never use a worn or damaged pulley.
Make sure all pulley mounting hardware is in place and
properly tightened. Correct conditions shown in figures 1,
2 and 3 above. Adjust until straight edge touches all four (fig.4) A 13/64” belt deflection should pro-
contact points and belt is fully engaged (fig. 3) in grooves. duce a 23 to 34 pound tension tester reading.

Comments: Too Loose or too tight is not a good condition for any belt drive system. Too loose
causes, belt squealing, lose of power, belt failure and pulley wear. Too tight, can cause bearing fail-
ure, premature wear and possible crank and blower shaft failure that, could lead to more dangerous
and expensive damage.

Note: The Air Cub auxiliary drive uses a Powerband belt (P/N 5718813).
DO NOT substitute belt without approval from your distributor, or
the Elgin/Five Star Manufacturing service department.

Procedure: Using a belt tension tester (P/N 1067675) and a straight edge, find the amount of
force required to deflect the belt as shown in Fig. 4.

With proper tension, the belt will deflect 13/64” when a force of 23 to 34 pounds is applied.

If necessary adjust drive tension until proper tension is achieved. DO NOT OVER TIGHTEN,
“tighter is better” may prevent belt slippage, but it can destroy other components.

Do not try to allow for belt stretch by initially over tightening, tension loss is not always consistent.
An initially over tightened belt may still be too tight even after it stretches during operation.

When tension is correct, recheck the pulley faces as shown in figures 1 and 2 above.

Check the tension again after 8 hours of operation and adjust as necessary.

7/01 P/N 0713022-A

TECH-TIP