I had no choice but to move my car from its storage space to another location. I stupidly forgot to disconnect my battery for the winter and it has been sitting for about 5 months so needless to say the battery is crappola. I didnt have a battery with me and the car had to be moved so I boosted the battery and moved it. It has sat in new location for 3 days and battery is still dead.
My question is: does running a car with a dead battery put really bad strain on the alternator?
I will be getting a new battery soon and am not driving the car in the meantime (obviously) but does that inital drive do any damage?

 

Yes it does actually, the alternator is there to keep the battery up to charge NOT to recharge a dead battery. so if you have a bad battery you will overcharge and fry the little alternator. so get a good battery i run optima spiral core

 

If the battery is still electrically sound (no dead or shorted cells), it may not be as bad as you think. Keep all of the car's unnecessary electrical loads off. I would venture to guess that a good battery with 8v or better should be rechargeable, but the alt is going to work its *** off for a while. If the battery or charging wires start to get too hot to keep your hand on them, shut her down for a while (the alt will get very hot too)...

If your alt warning light stays on after start, then the regulator is preventing a charging operation that may damage the alt (part of its job).

 

If you can, just take your battery to Advance Auto if it is nearby. They will test/recharge your battery for FREE. That makes life considerably easier.

Vince

 

My battery is dead.

 

most of the times when your overcharging and the alternator is overworking itself we usualy see that the stator is ruined also because of the high heat and too much load. remember our alternators are only rated at 60-70 amps, yet last STOCK FC alternator we tested only put out a measly 50 amps. so the little alternators FCs are equiped with will quickly burn up with a bad battery. so its just cheaper to buy a new battery then buy a new alternator.

and charging a battery that wont hold a load is worthless. yes it may have 12.5 volts but no amps to crank anything over. a 70 dollar battery is cheaper than a $115 alternator