Amazingly, I was able to drive though stop and go traffic 20 miles without any other indication of a failure. I had been through at least one failure before, and under similar circumstances.

August 2001, I had just finished visiting my friend in NJ and I had gotten lost trying to get back to the Turnpike. Then, I find that my engine is stalling, my stereo is cutting out, and my defrosters aren't working. I limp through traffic and find an open Service center (On a Sunday). Fortuantely, I was up and running the next morning. The only downside was that I had to wait overnight for the part. When I called my friend for a ride, she asked me "how the hell did you get way out there?"

May 2003. This morning, I find that the voltage is at 12V and doesn't increase. Since I hadn't experienced the same problems I had before, I decided to chance it and drive to the learning center (I've been there this past week to prep for a Novell 5.1 CNA certification). I didn't have a single problem. Later, after stopping at a nearby K-Mart to buy a volt meter (they didn't have one!), and then having to drive around and find a place that did, I checked the battery and, sure enough, it was a dead alternator.

Through all this, the engine always started up, and it never stalled. Before the trip, I had replaced the previous generic battery with an Optima Red Top and new battery cables. We're talking more than an hour running, maybe two. This is one amazing battery and if you need a new battery, get an Optima!

Anyway, I first stop at a parts place to see if they could get a new alt in-they didn't have one in stock anywhere (had to wait overnight). So, I'm forced to leave the car overnight at a service center and call for a ride. When my ride arrived, he asked "how the hell did you get way out here?"

I seem to have bad karma or something with alternators. Two bad alternators, both out of town, with the same weather and asked the same question.

The first alternator was replaced with a Reman, as will the new one. I had roughly just over 10000 miles on this alternator. So, as soon as I can, I'm going to buy a 200AMP Contour alt, keep the previous one as a spare, and install it myself!

 

have you checked the charging circuits? i recently discovered a half-broken alt wire on mine and i think that was the source of all my charging problems...although ill give it a week before im sure on that.

 

I checked the alternator wire and got roughly 11.9 Volts, check the battery and had roughly 12 volts. While the engine was running, I had about the same.

The battery was definitely not charging, and the alt wire wasn't broken or loose.

 

It could be a bad voltage regulator, but I couldn't diagnose, and I'm in unfamiliar geographical territory. This is more or less a "quick fix" (which I don't like doing), but a necessary one to get me up and running ASAP.

 

Sometimes alternators just have problems. I had a bad alternator on my car a little over a year ago. My lights would flicker, my fan would turn down, my radio would cut out every once in a while when I was driving, and eventually I couldn't start the car because of it without jumping it, then it charged fine again for a while. After it kept doing it I replaced it with a reman, and shortly after my engine blew, so I never really got a chance to test it. Recently I got the car back up and running and that alt just would not charge the battery. Id have to manually charge it every other night. So I got an FD alt and now things are working perfect (so far...), 14.5v at idle compared to my old 10.5. It was just a bad reman I guess.

 

Actually, it wasn't a failed alternator. When I replaced my battery cables, the wire that leads from battery positive to the fuse box was loose. As it turns out, if the alternator was in stock and I hadn't let the service shop diagnose it, I'd have wasted over $100 on one loose wire.