ahoy from the northwoods
anyway i just got my 02 4.0 manual about 3 weeks ago and when i first bought it used at a dealership it had a slight squeak in the belt/engine area. after discovering a few more little faults i brought it back and they fixed it all for free.
yesterday a few friends and i decided to go riding around in the mud. we didnt do anything extreme, nuthing over the tops of the rims, and i somewhat babied it(didnt just floor it through evry hole). when i got back i heard that squeaking again. my friend told me that it was just some water on the belt and itll go away in a few miles of highway driving. well after about 5 miles of highway, it hadnt stopped. when i started it this morning(after a subfreezing night) it was still squeaking.

any ideas?
easy fix?
or am i screwed?

 

you bought a ford so sad to say it will probably stay.

you can try a new belt because i bet the dealer just put on belt dressing and didnt actually replace it. if that doesnt work you might need a new tensioner pulley, but odds are its going to stay, ive replaced everything on my truck and mine still squeeks in the rain

 

Sounds like the tension pulley. I had the same problem. First time they changed the belt and it was fine for a while then the squeek came back and then the pulley needed to be replaced.

 

does the pulley replacement really help though?

 

During the winter, mine started to sqeek. I replaced the belt and idler pulley and it is all good now. In my view of the vehicles that I have worked on, Ford is always good about a idler pulley going bad. I would replace it first. My .02

 

in my case, no. i just have/had nice new pulleys