When I bought my car (92 Olds Custom Cruiser,) the alternator was going bad. No problem, just replace it, right? So I did. It's been about a month since I replaced it, and now this one too seems to be on the verge of failure.
And this time, it's weird. I have a roughly 45 mile commute to work each day. On my way home the other day, all was well until less than three miles from my house, when the gauge went down to about 10 and the amp light came on. got it home, shut it off and tried again. Same result. 30 minutes later, same. an hour, same. two hours, same. five hours later, it was back into the healthy charging range and the light was out. Fast forward to this morning, I drove it in fine, but then about three miles from work, same thing happened. The car is definitely down on electricity when this happens.
Also, these new symptoms are completely different than the ones experienced with the old alternator, which couldn't handle a load at speeds too far off of idle.
Electrical systems are like voodoo magic to me. I know nothing of them, yet. Thanks in advance for any help.
Generic FLAPs rebuilt? Many are of low quality and won't last nearly as long as the factory original. I've had a number of the so-called rebuilt units fail in under a month.
Replacement alternator is probably defective. It sounds like the voltage regulator is crapping out when it gets warm.
It's also possible, but much less likely, to be a flaky battery. I have seen a lot of sealed and gel cell batteries do some crazy stuff before they died for good.
GM was using an absolutely horrible undersized alternator at that time too. I changed hundreds of them. Nice moneymaker for me, not so much fun for the owners.
tuna55
MegaDork
9/11/15 8:27 a.m.
foxtrapper wrote:
Generic FLAPs rebuilt? Many are of low quality and won't last nearly as long as the factory original. I've had a number of the so-called rebuilt units fail in under a month.
!!!
+1
Get a good Delco unit, maybe used, and never look back. Either that or get the lifetime warranty unit from the LAPS and be prepared to replace it every few months.
I work at Napa, and that's where I got it, so getting another isn't a problem.
I figured it was potentially faulty, but I wanted to check with you guys before I put another alternator on it.
About the only wear item in an alternator is the brushes. On high mileage units the brushes wear down so that the springs cannot maintain contact with the slip rings. This happens at higher rpms. Many time ne brushes are all that is needed to bring an alternator back to life.
It has been noted that some "rebuilt" units still have the old brushes.
This is the sorry state of our replacement parts system today.
If you have local shop that rebuilds alternators, this is the better way to go
iceracer wrote:
It has been noted that some "rebuilt" units still have the old brushes.
This is the sorry state of our replacement parts system today.
It's also a possible side-effect of the sorry state of diagnostics. Enough people shotgun parts that a sizable percentage of core returns actually are perfectly good parts. So a remanufacturer trying to shave any penny because they're fighting for price-point customers would do well to do a quick test of every core, if it is good on the tester then a quick bead-blast and coat of paint later it is "remanufactured". If half of them come back under warranty, they're still money ahead.
