1991 Dakota 318 TBI Belt Tensioner made of Unobtainium

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went to an aap i used to work at bout 25 min from me. i had chad look tensioner up and his l/u says dayco 89315. i looked up at home under belt tensioner assembly for 91 dak sport 318 and it still shows 89434/910556a. i asked chad why is there more choices at home than in store. he said may be that there are more sources to pull parts from than at individuals area stores.
 
DionR said:
Oh, and I did call Advance Auto. He said they can't get it and couldn't cross it to anything.

Guess it's time to swap a 5.7 Hemi into it. That'll fix it!

:steering:
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I think most superchargers also come with a belt tensioner, so that's another option
 
Answer to prayer.

There were two 1991 Dakota's with the 5.2 in one of the local pick and pull yards. Left work early yesterday with the hope of finding a workable tensioner. First one was missing the part (I see a trend...), but the first had only been there for a couple of days and it still had the part, and it felt like it was still in good shape. Feels pretty unlikely that the one year only truck would be in the yard with the part I needed, but there it was.

Grabbed a new belt on the way home and slapped it on with my pulley and I am on the road again.

:steering:
 
DionR said:
Answer to prayer.

There were two 1991 Dakota's with the 5.2 in one of the local pick and pull yards. Left work early yesterday with the hope of finding a workable tensioner. First one was missing the part (I see a trend...), but the first had only been there for a couple of days and it still had the part, and it felt like it was still in good shape. Feels pretty unlikely that the one year only truck would be in the yard with the part I needed, but there it was.

Grabbed a new belt on the way home and slapped it on with my pulley and I am on the road again.

:steering:
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Would you be willing to sell the belt tensioner off the 1991 5.2l v8
 
Jsbuzzard said:
Would you be willing to sell the belt tensioner off the 1991 5.2l v8
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I can’t sell it until I pull the motor. Using the truck right now so can’t disable it.

Plan is to try and swap in a 5.9 this summer with the MEFI and won’t need it after that. If you can wait until then, I could sell it after that.

Have you looked into the tensioner mentioned in the link above?
 
DionR said:
I can’t sell it until I pull the motor. Using the truck right now so can’t disable it.

Plan is to try and swap in a 5.9 this summer with the MEFI and won’t need it after that. If you can wait until then, I could sell it after that.

Have you looked into the tensioner mentioned in the link above?
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Yes I can wait that long the link above did not work for me
 
Jsbuzzard said:
Yes I can wait that long the link above did not work for me
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Ok, I will try and make sure to reach out when the motor comes out.

Here is what the link above pointed to:

I must have found 2 of the other five peoplke in the country that a '91 Dakota with a 318. My tensioner also went out about a month ago. I called every parts store in my area (NH, not really that many!), I called 18 junk yards, I called 3 large Dodge dealers across the country who did nation wide searches, I even called Chryler customer service in Canada and had them do a nation wide search. This part is not available any where!
The good news is this: Tim Austin of Austin Automotive here in Fitzwilliam went to a couple parts store and went through about 100 tensioners and came up with something that works. What he bought is Gates Tensioner, number 89217. The tensioner bolted in without modification, but the pulley had to be changed because it was an interior style, had grooves. If you do this you might need a slightly shorter belt. The travel range seems to be slightly offset from what came stock. However, it is installed on my truck and working!
 
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Is this the setup this post is about?
 
DionR said:
Ok, I will try and make sure to reach out when the motor comes out.

Here is what the link above pointed to:

I must have found 2 of the other five peoplke in the country that a '91 Dakota with a 318. My tensioner also went out about a month ago. I called every parts store in my area (NH, not really that many!), I called 18 junk yards, I called 3 large Dodge dealers across the country who did nation wide searches, I even called Chryler customer service in Canada and had them do a nation wide search. This part is not available any where!
The good news is this: Tim Austin of Austin Automotive here in Fitzwilliam went to a couple parts store and went through about 100 tensioners and came up with something that works. What he bought is Gates Tensioner, number 89217. The tensioner bolted in without modification, but the pulley had to be changed because it was an interior style, had grooves. If you do this you might need a slightly shorter belt. The travel range seems to be slightly offset from what came stock. However, it is installed on my truck and working!
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What size belt
 
@DionR …..Please post a picture of the belt routing on your truck. The motor in my picture is from a ‘91 Dakota and is a 5.2 but is missing the air pump.
 
Problem with removing the air pump is the tensioner works the wrong way. Without the air pump (or something similar), the tensioner can’t make the belt tight.

I tried to figure out a way to get rid of the airpump and best solution I could figure out was to swap in a 5.9. :D
 
What kills Me is that they bother to put a bracket & large idler in place of the A/C compressor to maintain routing & tensioning, yet take a different belt anyway, WTF? The engineers can't figure out how to match placement & pulley diameter?
 
Mr. Sinister said:
Thanks Dion I forgot to mention the 5.2 I have came from a non AC truck so another reason it might look a little different
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Mine is a non-AC setup as well. Best I recall, the belt routing is similar, but no AC pulley. Goes direct from the idler under the alt to the PS pump.
 
Killer6 said:
What kills Me is that they bother to put a bracket & large idler in place of the A/C compressor to maintain routing & tensioning, yet take a different belt anyway, WTF? The engineers can't figure out how to match placement & pulley diameter?
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Mine doesn't have a bracket and large idler in place of the AC compressor. Looks very similar to how the non-AC setup for a Magnum looks.
 
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