Cricket sound under the hood. Some times

some times I get a cricket sound under the hood. Like the belt may be slipping? I turned the ac on and then off and it went away. Doesn't seem to happen often but it is somewhat alarming.

What do you guys think?

 

Turning the AC off/on killed the cricket. They are starting to show up where I live...

 

Tensioner or idler pulley, methinks.
Mine does it too, sometimes, but only when it's fully warmed up (idle is at its lowest RPM).

 

Anything I should do or be worried about?

 

You can take off the serpentine and run the engine briefly to see if it still chirps. No more chirp means it's a tensioner pulley, replace it as soon as you reasonably can but don't freak out.

 

Pesticides work

 

lol that's your engine... 4banger joke... Nothing useful in this post.

 

It doesn't do it all the time. Engine has 10k miles and I've only heard it twice. Next time I take it in for service I will let them know so that they tell me they can't duplicate it and send me on my way.

 

Dude, it should be obvious that you might have a loose belt and that's probably all it is. Tighten them up a little. It's quite easy. With only 10,000 miles I highly doubt you have a bad tensioner unless it's just FUBAR'ED from the factory which is highly unlikely. You can loosen the belts and spin the tensioner to see if it feels rough. Mine is a 2004 with 156,000+ miles on it and there are no tensioner problems.

I always owned very old cars until I got this Taco. Therefore I had NO idea how easy it was to loosen/check belts and a cheap Hayne's Manual will explain how it's done. You could do it in 15mins including reading the manual to figure it out. Well, maybe 30 mins for the slow people like me.

If you can't get in there and check it out yourself you can try the "belt dressing" they sell at any auto parts store. If that gets rid of it you just have a loose belt.

 

^ These engines have automatic belt tensioners. How do you tighten a belt when there's an automatic tensioner? Wouldn't a loose belt mean a bad tensioner? Or the wrong belt?

 

Search for high pressure fuel pump chirping. There's multiple threads on it (I have one as well). But there's one that has video and it's probably the same thing you have.

 

Mine was the lower idler near the power steering pump. I pulled the idler and drifted out the bearings. Then using the bearing number bought 2 new ones on Amazon and installed them. The truck has been quiet as a mouse since.

 

Try localizing the area of the squeak first. Don't throw parts at it. I shot some Tri-Flow lube on the idler bearings till the squeak stopped and that is how I sourced it.