all had a great drive today in the 355.....125mph at times ....wonderfull.........the best car in the world ever......... noticed a squealing noise when engine idling...went away with revs.....sounds like a squaking fan belt..but could not see a fan belt...any ideas what this is...alternator bearing perhaps....should i be concerned?????
I get a squealing sound at startup-very briefly most of the time. I believe it may be a tensioner sound from mine, as my belts are pretty snug. Maybe somebody can set me straight on this. Mark
Sounds like you both either need some belt adjustment or your belts are worn out. Here are some pics that I have from Fchat. The alt and a/c belt can be adjusted from underneath. The p/steering belt from the top. A little hard to get at. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
F355 alternator bearings, if that is indeed your problem, are a common issue on the cars. Early cars use a discrete bearing; later cars use a bearing pressed into a larger plastic hub. Both items are relatively (and that's a loaded term!) inexpensive.
I have more like a "Ping"-sound when i start the engine cold. Earlier i had the squeeling, and - yes, it was a belt not tightened enough. But now it "pings" when its cold... Its a bit irritating, but dissappears when engine has been running for a while... Its NOT the belts, it can not be, i have been wondering if it can be the headers warming up...? Kimmo/Sweden.
VERY hard to diagnose sounds over the internet Kimmo, but it may well be one/both of the headers cracked.
That comes from people not using a tension gauge to adjust the belt. We have never seen a bad 355 alt bearing.
I cannot hear it from here but I know from experience it will not get better or cheaper to continue to drive the car. Have it diagnosed.
My 355 (36K mi) started squealing intermittently upon startup a few weeks ago. It made this squealing sound for about 1-5 seconds about every 10th time I started the car. It was related to the engine RPM, but cycling the A/C and moving the streeing made no difference. A week ago, I was optimistic that it was a loose belt and tried tried slightly tightening the alternator belt. While in there I listened to the tensioner bearing with a stethescope. It seemed very loud when compared to the alternator bearing, loud enough to hurt my ears. I am not an expert at listening to bearings so I was not sure what I was hearing. Since I read here somewhere that getting the pulley out is a pain, I did not want to replace it unless I was sure that was the problem. I rotated the pulley by hand and it turned freely and smoothly, so I left it alone. Yesterday, when cruising at about 40 MPH I heard very bad mechanical sounds followed by a lot of blue smoke billowing out the forward part of the engine cowl. The smoke stopped after a few seconds but I then got the battery light and lost power steering. Turns out the alternator belt tensioner pulley seized up and the resulting friction broke the belt. Getting the tensioner pulley out took 5 minutes. You can see from the second picture that there is not enough room between the pulley and the firewall to get the pulley off the shaft, so the base of the pulley needs to come off with the pulley attached. There are three bolts that attach the base of the pulley to the engine. The top one ("D") is kind of hard to get to. I took out alternator bolt "C" so I could get my hand and a standard wrench in there to loosen bolt "D". The last picture shows the damage. Now on to getting new parts... If you are worried about the tensioner bearing, I would recommend checking it out with a stethescope. If it's loud, replace it! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Get real temporary care-takers. You are partaking in the FERRARI experience. If you hear something that does not sound right IE, the normal B-E-A-uitiful tones of music coming from the 355's engine compartment don't be a (rich) dope. Look into in "NOW" not later or get your mechanic onto it if you can't. It turns my belly to hear how you just went in and tighten a belt to solve a noise issue. How do you know it was not too tight already? Then, you tighten it up some more until something broke. Now you get to replace the bearing and the belt and ? You got very lucky on this one. Please, don't try that one with your timing belt tensioner's. I don't mean to sound like a pompous d*ck (I'm not) but did you clean the bolt threads, or put some light lock-tight on them before re-installation, or torque the bolts back in place, or just pull as hard as you could? I feel like I have a responsibility as a Ferrari owner but, maybe I am alone on this thought? Ferrari's are a sacred car, a dream car. And when I am in one, I feel like I am one of the fortunate few! If you feel different I guess you just pay more for ownership and have egg on your face as you are standing at the side of the road with a broken down dream car and a cr*ppy Corrola blows by you with blue smoke billowing in your face as it passes with the sound of a broken muffler dragging behind. (Drama added) LOL, Your humble servant
Interesting notes about getting that tensioner bracket off with the pulley...much harder to do when there aren't 3 bolts holding in onto the engine. My 1997 355 has 3 studs and nuts. Much more difficult. Does anyone have a tip on getting the bracket off with the pulley? It looks like I might have to double nut and pull the studs out. I will be replacing them with bolts for sure.! Thanks to all. Tim
My 355 squeals at start up every time. Faint and very high pitched, like some sort of air valve leak. You can actually hear it shut off after 3 min or so. I just thought it was akin to the air pump gargle of the 348. Unless someone says I should worry, my thought is ...eh, why worry? But please tell me if you think I should worry!
that really depends on where the squealing comes from in your engine bay. I would worry if the noise comes from the front of the engine bay, but not from the back near the bumper.
Hi Tom, You described that squealing noise precisely like my 355B. I am 99% sure that your alternator tensioner bearing is going to fail soon. I will go out on the limb (you can saw it off...LOL) and say that within a few hundred miles or less, it will either break or seize..and then shred your serpentine belt. It is a bit tricky to repair. There are two new but different pulley/bearing upgrades from Ricambi. You will need to let Daniel know what year your car is and the assembly number, not the VIN number. Give him a call and have the two parts sent to you. It is better to replace the belt and that pulley/bearing (one unit together) before the old bearing fails. Good luck to you.
Sorry if I highjacked this thread, but thanks to you both. I just got it back from a full major two weeks ago, and I know it was making that same noise at the shop (since it's been doing it since I purchased the car) so I'll listen to where its coming from before I call Daniel.
