It started at the beginning of this winter, when I would start the car in the morning I would hear a squeaking coming from something on the serpentine belt assembly. The noise would usually go away in a minute or two. It is defiantly not the sound of a loose belt squeaking, and sounds more like a bearing going out. I am pretty confident it is the alternator, though I have not seen a battery light come on. As time went on the squeak would take longer to go away. Now its changed pitch and sound considerably, and is taking a 20 min drive to go away. I am starting to worry about the bearing seizing up.

How difficult is it to install a new unit? It looks pretty difficult as far as location goes, and doing some searching on the forum did not yield many encouraging results. Some said go from the bottom, taking off the down pipe, half shaft..... Some said go from the top, taking off the strut bar, throttle body....
So what is the correct way to do this job?

Many thanks.

 

verify whats making the noise before just ripping stuff apart. You can buy a stethoscope cheap and use that. You could also remove the serp belt and spin stuff around till you find the squeaker.

 

Also you can try to spray some of those belt dressing to rule out the belt that is loose or slipping.

 

I see you have an evo 9 this sticky may help you.

https://www.evolutionm.net/forums/ev...elt-video.html

 

Agreed that you should verify the noise before tearing stuff apart. That is odd, Hope you figure it out.

 

Have you done the 60K service ?
I would take the serpentine belt off and run the engine for a min. This should rule out the alternator. Also since you have an IX it could be the bracket that was updated after people complained about noise. The Tbelt rubs on it.
There is a sticky thread on it somewhere.

1091A133 Bracket Cylinder Block.

 

The Car had the 60K service including the timing belt before I got it. I tried spraying some PB blaster on the pulley shaft on the inside of the pulley to see if by chance any of it would cure the squeak. It took a couple of days but it seems to be getting quieter, I will definitely do more investigating to figure out what the bad component actually is. jason42003, I took a look at the video, it sounds similar but mine has more of a metallic sound to it, witch is why it was scaring me....
Looks like its just time to get my hands dirty.