ive been fighting this problem for 5 years now and 3 alternators later (one rebuilt to 77amps). my alternator cant keep up with my cars power accessories, wipers, lights and fan. the guage at cruise with no acc. is 13.5 volts, and at idle is 11 volts. with stuff turned on its 11.5 volts at cruise and 10 volts at idle. it doesnt matter what alternator i use or what i do, it still sucks. and you gotta rev the car to 3000 rpm to get the field to energize. ive had them tested and all the alternators come up good. and ive re-done all the wiring to the fusible link with 10 guage, 1 step up from the factory 12 guage. if i got my lights on at idle there dim, and get brighter if i rev it. it doesnt get brighter after 1200 rpm. what the heck is going on, i need help

 

voltage regulater?

 

Have you checked to see if the two 12 gauge wires going to the battery have a good connection? Mine popped off once and the car acted kind of like what you're describing.

 

listne dont mess around with it any more check this out and get it... ill be buying one later on to upgrade so that my 1600 watt amp gets lal the juice it needs to run the 15 inches subs ill be puting in..http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/HIGH-...spagenameZWDVW

 

well ive re-done the wiring, and its like the 3rd one, all the same problems, ill re-check the wiring again, and see if something came loose, but the problem existed before and after the wiring upgrade. any other ideas?

 

higher gauge wire ? maybe 4 gauge or 2 gauge ? hell if your krazy 0 gauge.. maybe somthng to due with the internal or external regulator ?

 

turbo alts have bigger amps i tought then NA might try that...

 

Try running some grounding cables through your engine compartment SHADY. I dont think it's a problem with the alternator. I've used my stock NA alternator to power my stereo with my lights and wipers on with no problems. And if you've redone the alternator wiring then that's not your problem. It can't be the voltage regulator cause those are internal with our alternators so every time you get a new alternator you get a new voltage regulator.

 

What kind of shape is your battery in? What's the volts read with the car off? How's the shape of the wires that connect to the alt? They may need to be replaced since the wiring is 20+ years old.

 

i got 1 guage battery cables, and i got an ac delco 7 year warranty battery that is 3 months old, before that die hard security, and both had same diagnostic stuff. my other 280's have no issues, its guage is actually at 15 volts all the time no matter what, this car is just wierd i guess, if i want to check the alt on the car where do i check it, i want to disconnect the guage to see if its the problem, but i think i already tried another dash + guage cluster 2 years ago.

 

so I am guessing that senc it has new battery, and wires the terminals are O.K. so that would leav me to agree with the ground straping mentiond in the preveous post. Maybe the alternator has bad ground or somthing a bad ground can be tricky to find sometimes.

 

You're going to want to get some Capacitors before you get the bigger alternator if you haven't yet

(sorry it was off topic)

 

Just remember, whatever you do to fix your hot wires (power wires) i.e. going to a bigger wire, make sure you do the same to the negative (ground wires) The same current is going through them to complete the cuircut and if the ground wire terminus (grounding point) is rusty or anything then relocated the ground point because it can cause a faulty contact and if the wire is to small it can create resistance and heat (fire hazard) be careful.

 

yeah thats why i got #1 guage + and -. the main ground runs to the car chassis then directly to the motor, so you mean to put one directly from the block to the alt?

 

Couldn't hurt to try it. Worse case scenario is that your alternator is already grounded good and it does nothing to help. Best case scenario is that your problem is fixed.

 

Hey I got a similar problem with mine it will only charge at idle and at night with all my accesories on it will die and now it dies all the time. I was wondering were the voltage regulator was on this car as well? and You guys said something about a fusable link and I was wondering where that was too?

 

The voltage regulator is an internal type and is part of the alternator itself. It can be swapped individually, but it's not really worth the hastle. Just get a new alternator and be done with it. A fusible link would not cause that symptom at all.

Rod.