[tonycarreon]

so i thought i had the famous cat heat shield rattle - from reading all the posts it seemed like that was my exact problem. played with it and never got it to go away. was thinking of cutting it off soon because it has gotten worse.

i read some posts on another forum and a user mentioned that he had a rattle that seemed like the heat shield but after poking around discovered one of the idle pulleys was loose. he tightened the tension pulley and rattle went away.

went out and removed the carpet and heat shield, started it up and lo and behold the noise was actually coming from the front of the engine and transmitting to the rear by what i assume was the exhaust. tightened up one one of the pulley nuts and the noise got a lot less noticible. not gone yet...

i started thinking back and i remember the noise started about 600 miles after replacing the alternator...

questions:
1. what is the torque value on the nut that's attached to the pulley near the alternator?
From Pelican / Wayne
Upper Pulley:
- 34 ft-lb (46 Nm) for the upper bolt if it's an M10x145 (8.8) bolt
- 48 ft-lb (65 Nm) if it's an M10x145 (10.9)

Lower Pulley:
- The lower pulley is tightened to 17 ft-lb (23 Nm) only

2. i see two pulleys on the parts site i go to, i assume they're not interchangeable.

3. it's a remanned alternator so i wonder if that could be contributing.

4. has anyone else experienced this?

i replaced the belt before the alternator and wonder if taking it off and putting it back on to do the alternator may have introduced some slack causing it to vibrate. it does seem to vibrate between the WP and alternator, but i would think of there was a problem it would have shredded by now. i don't see any evidence of it actually rubbing anything.