Some people will think that this is preparation overkill.
I am doing this for two reasons:
1. When I am out in the middle of nowhere, if I blow a belt for any reason, I am up a creek without a paddle. There might not be a Polaris belt to be had within 250 miles in any direction. And if I got a belt, I'd still need tools. Collecting all of that stuff after my belt has broken is the dumb way to do it. That kind of event ruins trips for everyone in the group and tends to be expensive.
I'm not going to be the guy who gets stranded and has to get towed out or call for an airlift, ruining the ride for everyone, because I was unprepared for a common CVT failure.
2. It seems to me that 1 in 5 people believe that it is their solemn duty to educate me on the fact that they heard that Polaris vehicles have a tendency to break CVT belts. There is nothing I can say to change their mind about this. It will vary in degrees of annoyingness, from a casual mention and a shrug, to it becoming the topic of a seemingly endless conversation around the campfire after a day's ride, to someone obsessing about it while planning a trip, sending me quotes from people supporting their anxiety, and suggesting that I buy things like a belt temperature sensor that installs into the CVT exhaust and has a gauge on my dashboard.
If you read the post below, buy the stuff for your tool kit, and make sure you can do it with only what you have in your tool kit (do a practice run), then you can say the following to those people:
"I have a spare belt and all of the tools I need to clean out the blown belt and replace it. I have practiced doing this with only the tools in my kit. Can YOU do that with YOUR vehicle?"
Most of the time, that shuts people the hell up.
Now on to the How-To:
You will need the following items:
1. Pulley Puller Tool (Note: This is listed as fitting the RZR-S 800. I tested it on my ACE. It works.)
2. 3/8" ratchet.
3. 10mm socket
4. 15mm socket.
5. 16mm socket.
6. 19mm socket.
7. 3/8" wrench.
8. Short extension.
9. Medium extension.
10. Cheater bar. (I used a piece of tube steel just big enough to slip over a few inches of the end of the ratchet.)
11. Bracing bar. (Make sure it is soft so it does not damage the pulley. I used a 7/8" wooden dowel.)
12. Anti-seize. Slather this into the threads of your puller tool and bag it up in a tough waterproof bag. That tool is worth its weight in gold in a trail emergency.
13. A Polaris #3211149 drive belt.
View attachment 364 View attachment 363
Obviously, you need to first remove the PVT cover. There are 8 lag screws holding the PVT cover on. The heads are 10mm.
Some of them are annoyingly hard to reach because of crap in the way. That is why you have two different sized socket extensions.
Before you can get the cover out, you will need to remove the grease zirk on the left rear A-arm. I find this highly annoying. Polaris saw fit to put a grease zirk right in the way of getting the PVT cover off.
You can avoid this by lifting up the rear of the vehicle until the left rear tire is off the ground. If you're on the trail, you'll probably be able to manage this with a buddy or two and a big rock or stick, or your winch and some creativity.
Once you lift the vehicle enough to get the rear wheels off the ground, you can remove the PVT cover. But it's much easier to have a 3/8" wrench in your toolkit and remove the zirk.
Once the zirk is out of the way, It's still a bit fiddly. You have to angle it just right and apply some pressure, and then the cover flexes a little and pops out of there.
View attachment 349
Once you get the cover off, here is your PVT system:
View attachment 350
You might notice some wear on your PVT cover. Even after only about 10 minutes of driving my rig on pavement, here is what mine looks like:
View attachment 351
It is possible to remove and install a belt by hand, and if you can do this, you will save some time if your belt is still in one piece and just not working right, or if it snapped cleanly.
First make sure your vehicle is in neutral.
All you have to do to remove a belt is shove the belt down into the driven pulley as hard as you can, then pull the belt onto the lip of the driven pulley and rotate the pulley.
It helps to get it tight and then use the drive pulley to help it along.
Putting the belt back on goes pretty much the same way.
But here's the thing: I have heard that when these belts go, they EXPLODE all over the place in a mess of strings and rubber bits.
Those strings, if you do not remove them, will wrap around the shafts and destroy the seals, resulting in a sloppy mess and expensive repairs.
If this has happened, you have to remove the pulleys and clean that crap out.
I started with the drive pulley. The bolt is 16mm. It is a normal right hand thread. If it is the same as the RZR, the torque on this bolt is supposed to be 40 ft-lbs.
40 lbs felt about right when I removed it. I had to use a bracer bar to keep the pulley from turning when I loosened it.
View attachment 352
Once you get the retaining bolt out, then you need the puller tool. Make sure you have put anti-seize in the threads.
Thread the puller tool in there until it seats (about a half inch of thread will be visible) and re-position your bracing bar.
View attachment 353
The puller tool needs a 19mm socket. Put pressure on it until you feel it "break". Then do a few more easy strokes until the pulley is loose.
Remove the puller tool and put it back into its bag right away. Do not put it on the ground and get dirt in the threads.
Now you can remove the pulley from the crankshaft.
View attachment 354
Now it's time for the driven pulley. It is a 15mm bolt. It is a normal right-hand thread.
I do not know what the torque spec for the driven pulley is either. If it is the same as the RZR it should be 17 lbs, but I could not get mine loose by hand.
I tried a cheater bar and a block of 2x4 jammed between the belt and the pulley for resistance, and I could not budge it. So I cheated. I hooked up the impact wrench and popped that SOB off.
(I will NOT have an impact wrench with me on the trail, but I put that pulley back on at 20 ft-lbs like I do with my RZR. I will be able to remove it by hand now.)
I highly recommend that you practice this procedure and break loose your pulley bolts at home so you know they are manageable on the trail.
You are, of course, solely responsible for finding out the correct torque and setting it on your machine.
Once you get the driven pulley off, you'll want to be careful. There is a washer floating around in the middle of it. Don't lose it.
View attachment 358 View attachment 365
Now you can clean the strings and crap from around the shafts, if there is any. If there is none, YAY! You have not wasted time/effort, you have been safe instead of sorry.
If your pulley comes apart at any time during this process, make sure you get that washer back in the middle. In fact, check it anyway.
If you are not removing your drive pulley, but did remove your driven pulley and need to reassemble it with a belt on it: I suggest putting the back half of the pulley on the shaft, putting the washer in, and then putting the front half on. You can do this with the belt on (it is kind of fiddly) or with the belt off and then bsqueeze your belt on over the assembled pulley.
The two halves of the driven pulley are supposed to go together a certain way. Note the X marks on the two pulleys. Make sure to align those.
Now it is time for re-assembly.
The drive pulley is a press fit, no keys to align or anything. The driven pulley has splines.
I recommend this sequence:
1. Install driven pulley and tighten its bolt. At home, use a torque wrench and set it at 20 ft-lbs. On the trail, just get it tight, and check/re-tighten it with a torque wrench as soon as you can afterward.
2. Loop the belt around the driven pulley. Make sure the lettering is right-side up. That way you know you're always installing the belt facing the same direction.
3. Loop the belt around the drive pulley before you install the pulley. Then slide it onto the shaft, install the bolt, and tighten it up. 40 ft-lbs at home, "close enough" on the trail. Again, check it later.
So now you have your pulleys on and tightened, and your new belt on with the lettering facing you. Now you can put your PVT cover back on, set your ACE back on the ground, and RIDE!
Be gentle on that new belt for a while.
I am doing this for two reasons:
1. When I am out in the middle of nowhere, if I blow a belt for any reason, I am up a creek without a paddle. There might not be a Polaris belt to be had within 250 miles in any direction. And if I got a belt, I'd still need tools. Collecting all of that stuff after my belt has broken is the dumb way to do it. That kind of event ruins trips for everyone in the group and tends to be expensive.
I'm not going to be the guy who gets stranded and has to get towed out or call for an airlift, ruining the ride for everyone, because I was unprepared for a common CVT failure.
2. It seems to me that 1 in 5 people believe that it is their solemn duty to educate me on the fact that they heard that Polaris vehicles have a tendency to break CVT belts. There is nothing I can say to change their mind about this. It will vary in degrees of annoyingness, from a casual mention and a shrug, to it becoming the topic of a seemingly endless conversation around the campfire after a day's ride, to someone obsessing about it while planning a trip, sending me quotes from people supporting their anxiety, and suggesting that I buy things like a belt temperature sensor that installs into the CVT exhaust and has a gauge on my dashboard.
If you read the post below, buy the stuff for your tool kit, and make sure you can do it with only what you have in your tool kit (do a practice run), then you can say the following to those people:
"I have a spare belt and all of the tools I need to clean out the blown belt and replace it. I have practiced doing this with only the tools in my kit. Can YOU do that with YOUR vehicle?"
Most of the time, that shuts people the hell up.
Now on to the How-To:
You will need the following items:
1. Pulley Puller Tool (Note: This is listed as fitting the RZR-S 800. I tested it on my ACE. It works.)
2. 3/8" ratchet.
3. 10mm socket
4. 15mm socket.
5. 16mm socket.
6. 19mm socket.
7. 3/8" wrench.
8. Short extension.
9. Medium extension.
10. Cheater bar. (I used a piece of tube steel just big enough to slip over a few inches of the end of the ratchet.)
11. Bracing bar. (Make sure it is soft so it does not damage the pulley. I used a 7/8" wooden dowel.)
12. Anti-seize. Slather this into the threads of your puller tool and bag it up in a tough waterproof bag. That tool is worth its weight in gold in a trail emergency.
13. A Polaris #3211149 drive belt.
View attachment 364 View attachment 363
Obviously, you need to first remove the PVT cover. There are 8 lag screws holding the PVT cover on. The heads are 10mm.
Some of them are annoyingly hard to reach because of crap in the way. That is why you have two different sized socket extensions.
Before you can get the cover out, you will need to remove the grease zirk on the left rear A-arm. I find this highly annoying. Polaris saw fit to put a grease zirk right in the way of getting the PVT cover off.
You can avoid this by lifting up the rear of the vehicle until the left rear tire is off the ground. If you're on the trail, you'll probably be able to manage this with a buddy or two and a big rock or stick, or your winch and some creativity.
Once you lift the vehicle enough to get the rear wheels off the ground, you can remove the PVT cover. But it's much easier to have a 3/8" wrench in your toolkit and remove the zirk.
Once the zirk is out of the way, It's still a bit fiddly. You have to angle it just right and apply some pressure, and then the cover flexes a little and pops out of there.
View attachment 349
Once you get the cover off, here is your PVT system:
View attachment 350
You might notice some wear on your PVT cover. Even after only about 10 minutes of driving my rig on pavement, here is what mine looks like:
View attachment 351
It is possible to remove and install a belt by hand, and if you can do this, you will save some time if your belt is still in one piece and just not working right, or if it snapped cleanly.
First make sure your vehicle is in neutral.
All you have to do to remove a belt is shove the belt down into the driven pulley as hard as you can, then pull the belt onto the lip of the driven pulley and rotate the pulley.
It helps to get it tight and then use the drive pulley to help it along.
Putting the belt back on goes pretty much the same way.
But here's the thing: I have heard that when these belts go, they EXPLODE all over the place in a mess of strings and rubber bits.
Those strings, if you do not remove them, will wrap around the shafts and destroy the seals, resulting in a sloppy mess and expensive repairs.
If this has happened, you have to remove the pulleys and clean that crap out.
I started with the drive pulley. The bolt is 16mm. It is a normal right hand thread. If it is the same as the RZR, the torque on this bolt is supposed to be 40 ft-lbs.
40 lbs felt about right when I removed it. I had to use a bracer bar to keep the pulley from turning when I loosened it.
View attachment 352
Once you get the retaining bolt out, then you need the puller tool. Make sure you have put anti-seize in the threads.
Thread the puller tool in there until it seats (about a half inch of thread will be visible) and re-position your bracing bar.
View attachment 353
The puller tool needs a 19mm socket. Put pressure on it until you feel it "break". Then do a few more easy strokes until the pulley is loose.
Remove the puller tool and put it back into its bag right away. Do not put it on the ground and get dirt in the threads.
Now you can remove the pulley from the crankshaft.
View attachment 354
Now it's time for the driven pulley. It is a 15mm bolt. It is a normal right-hand thread.
I do not know what the torque spec for the driven pulley is either. If it is the same as the RZR it should be 17 lbs, but I could not get mine loose by hand.
I tried a cheater bar and a block of 2x4 jammed between the belt and the pulley for resistance, and I could not budge it. So I cheated. I hooked up the impact wrench and popped that SOB off.
(I will NOT have an impact wrench with me on the trail, but I put that pulley back on at 20 ft-lbs like I do with my RZR. I will be able to remove it by hand now.)
I highly recommend that you practice this procedure and break loose your pulley bolts at home so you know they are manageable on the trail.
You are, of course, solely responsible for finding out the correct torque and setting it on your machine.
Once you get the driven pulley off, you'll want to be careful. There is a washer floating around in the middle of it. Don't lose it.
View attachment 358 View attachment 365
Now you can clean the strings and crap from around the shafts, if there is any. If there is none, YAY! You have not wasted time/effort, you have been safe instead of sorry.
If your pulley comes apart at any time during this process, make sure you get that washer back in the middle. In fact, check it anyway.
If you are not removing your drive pulley, but did remove your driven pulley and need to reassemble it with a belt on it: I suggest putting the back half of the pulley on the shaft, putting the washer in, and then putting the front half on. You can do this with the belt on (it is kind of fiddly) or with the belt off and then bsqueeze your belt on over the assembled pulley.
The two halves of the driven pulley are supposed to go together a certain way. Note the X marks on the two pulleys. Make sure to align those.
Now it is time for re-assembly.
The drive pulley is a press fit, no keys to align or anything. The driven pulley has splines.
I recommend this sequence:
1. Install driven pulley and tighten its bolt. At home, use a torque wrench and set it at 20 ft-lbs. On the trail, just get it tight, and check/re-tighten it with a torque wrench as soon as you can afterward.
2. Loop the belt around the driven pulley. Make sure the lettering is right-side up. That way you know you're always installing the belt facing the same direction.
3. Loop the belt around the drive pulley before you install the pulley. Then slide it onto the shaft, install the bolt, and tighten it up. 40 ft-lbs at home, "close enough" on the trail. Again, check it later.
So now you have your pulleys on and tightened, and your new belt on with the lettering facing you. Now you can put your PVT cover back on, set your ACE back on the ground, and RIDE!
Be gentle on that new belt for a while.
