My 2006 beetle generator light came on the other day while driving. Turning became hard, and my engine turned off on me a minute after the idiot light came on. Tried to restart it immediatly after, same thing. I waited 15-20 minutes, and drove to the nearest parking lot, keeping everything in the car turned off.
With all of that, I thought the alternator was faulty. However, I took it to VW and they claim the charging system is working fine- nothings wrong with it, and no error codes came back
However, they did say the serpentine belt was loose. I have no idea how loose it is, and I was told by a different VW dealership that the serpentine belt was frayed about 6 months ago. I've been looking up symptoms of a loose serpentine belt, and it includes noises- I never heard any noises coming from my engine.
I have to drive 100+ miles soon and don't want to become stranded or damage my car.
Is having the serpentine belt changed something that could be the fix to the problem? Would a loose serpentine belt really cause the generator to fail? I was under the impression the serpentine belt had to completely break for that to happen. Has something to similar to this happened to anybody else?
Thanks so much for any input!