Might come in handy as I am looking to swap my seat belts out to match the exterior of the car. Break up the monotonous black interior a bit.
981 Belt replacement
All the videos and what not I have found are all for the 986/7 and not 981 specific. So I thought I'd post up my tips from having done this recently. If you do not drop anything this is maybe an hour job. I dropped, first the spacer then the bolt and the job to almost 3 hours. Where does the spacer and the bolt go when dropped, there is a cavity that is forward of the firewall at the bottom of the car, and you have to take the bottom engine cover off to get to it or even see it. Yes, took me nearly 2 hours to find the bolt and spacer.
Tools
10MM Wrench or socket
16MM combo wrench with box and open end.
30MM wrench or socket, I used vice grips.
Punch to tap spacer out.
magnet or some other way not to lose spacer
18" slim piece of wood or plastic, I used 18" ruler
Bent needle nose pliers
Steps
1. Remove carpet from back wall of cabin. Tip Speaker covers clips are towards the center so start there, lift up until clips come out and then slide towards center of car.
2. Remove the access cover 10MM bolts and 2 10MM nuts, pretty straight forward.
3. Remove the bolt that hold for the engine mount that runs through the spacer. You have to start with box end of wrench then switch to open end.
4. Fish out old belt. Rotate tensioner towards the center of the car to get the slack you need. This is where the 18" ruler came in handy. There is not much room under the main pulley so belt has to be pushed down to clear the lip then rotated vertical to be pulled up.
5. Replace belt. The ruler helped here as well, start with the main pulley at the bottom and work your way out and up around the edges to the "middle". The idler pulley at the top is where you finish installing belt, it has no lip so you don't have to have much slack to get it on.
6. Reinstall spacer and bolt. This is where a magnet and needle nose pliers or other means not to drop the spacer and bolt come in handy. Also, the worst thing to do here is to tap the spacer to low to start with, there is no good way to get it back up. So you have to remove and start over. You can see to get it lined up side to side and then leave it a little high get the bolt in there and tap it down until bolt goes through.
7. Reinstall engine cover.
8. Reinstall carpet and speaker covers.
The bolt you are trying to remove is on the other side of the firewall from the red arrow.
![Auto part Tire Wheel Alloy wheel Automotive tire]()
![Auto part Automotive design Exhaust system Tire Automotive exhaust]()
Here is a better view of bolt.
![Tire Auto part Automotive tire Automotive wheel system Wheel]()
![Auto part Wheel Tire Automotive wheel system Rim]()
This is the tensioner 30MM
![Tire Automotive tire Automotive design Carbon Automotive wheel system]()
View attachment 194033
Tools
10MM Wrench or socket
16MM combo wrench with box and open end.
30MM wrench or socket, I used vice grips.
Punch to tap spacer out.
magnet or some other way not to lose spacer
18" slim piece of wood or plastic, I used 18" ruler
Bent needle nose pliers
Steps
1. Remove carpet from back wall of cabin. Tip Speaker covers clips are towards the center so start there, lift up until clips come out and then slide towards center of car.
2. Remove the access cover 10MM bolts and 2 10MM nuts, pretty straight forward.
3. Remove the bolt that hold for the engine mount that runs through the spacer. You have to start with box end of wrench then switch to open end.
4. Fish out old belt. Rotate tensioner towards the center of the car to get the slack you need. This is where the 18" ruler came in handy. There is not much room under the main pulley so belt has to be pushed down to clear the lip then rotated vertical to be pulled up.
5. Replace belt. The ruler helped here as well, start with the main pulley at the bottom and work your way out and up around the edges to the "middle". The idler pulley at the top is where you finish installing belt, it has no lip so you don't have to have much slack to get it on.
6. Reinstall spacer and bolt. This is where a magnet and needle nose pliers or other means not to drop the spacer and bolt come in handy. Also, the worst thing to do here is to tap the spacer to low to start with, there is no good way to get it back up. So you have to remove and start over. You can see to get it lined up side to side and then leave it a little high get the bolt in there and tap it down until bolt goes through.
7. Reinstall engine cover.
8. Reinstall carpet and speaker covers.
The bolt you are trying to remove is on the other side of the firewall from the red arrow.
Here is a better view of bolt.
This is the tensioner 30MM
View attachment 194033
1 - 20 of 35 Posts
Update: Just an FYI. I evidently loosened the hose coming off my water pump when I was removing my old belt which resulting in a complete coolant leak/dump. My bad as i was unaware where the hose was located. I had the system drained and refilled by Performance Auto. 
Lesson learned.
Lesson learned.
1 - 20 of 35 Posts
