Disappointed and no one to blame but me
 

let me start by saying arg.

about a month ago my alternator died and i needed to replace it. i bought one used from a forum member and installed it myself. alt is easy to put on and take off!!!! but through my haste (it was a poker night when i put the alt on and i wanted to play) i made a mistake!

after installing it i notice that my voltage was not staying consistant and i knew i needed to check what was wrong, but i kept putting it off. about 3-4 weeks later my second alt that i bought went out. i was frustrated and pissed that my car is down again ialso thought it was a bad second alt. so i order a NEW alt and paid the extra cash. i get it last night, go to put it on, and catch my mistake from last time.

it turns out i did not tighten the nut that connects the "hot wire" to the L post in the back of the alt. enough, so when i drove the wire would connect and disconnect. apparently there were sparks, i fried the hot wire, the L post was melted, the insulation that goes around the wire was off, and i had bare wire exposed with half of the copper busted. the plastic part that covers that connection is burnt, and the copper on the wire has all this white and green residue on it from the copper wire cooroding.

i now need to replace this wire, so my questions are;
how long is that wire that i burnt?
does it have a break in it anywhere that connects to a harness, or another wire?
can i just cut what was burnt and crimp on new wire?
if i need to replace it, is there a certian place on the wire i should replace from?

also there is a moral to this. DONT DO CAR WORK IN HASTE!!!!
i am lucky i didn't start a fire or cause more damage!
i now have to worry if i may have fried something else.
also if you think something is wrong check it right away.

I am very disappointed in myself for allowing this to happen, it was an easy job and could have been easily avoided.

der!

you could do it the right way and get the wire from the junk yard (whole) then replace it OR you can do it the "other" way and replace only the first few inches. Remove the wire up to where visible melts in the plastic stop.

In order know the actual condition of the circuit/wire you are going to have to do a voltage drop test on the wire. The wire must be plugged into the alternator (if you can do that) and the car must be running. Use a multimeter and place the POS lead on the Pos battery post and then probe (starting at the alternator moving along the wire toward the source) the wire until the voltage drop is down to less than .2 V(if you can find a point less than .1V thats better)! From the point where the wire is less than .2V voltage drop you are going to have to solder and new wire connection in. DO NOT CRIMP. Crimps run excessive resistance causing a higher voltage drop and you will not have a properly functioning circuit.

If you cannot do this then just run new wire! But you still cannot use crimps, any connections must be soldered.

You made two mistakes

1. Working on the car in haste. Most everyone is guilty of that once-in-a-while.

2. Ignoring the problem, especially in an area in which you just worked on.

Never, ever be guilty of mistake 2, that is where the major problems come from.