Alternator issues
Posted: 26 Oct 2017, 21:55
I had a very disappointing evening last Friday. Instead of rolling down to Folkestone to get the Eurotunnel to Belgium for half term, we ended up getting towed back home having got only 25 miles out of London!
Anyway, I'm just posting this to ask some advice to see if my theory of what went wrong is plausible.
I changed the alternator drive belt a few weeks ago and as I was putting the new belt on I felt a wire that I had to move out of the way to slip the belt onto the alternator pulley. The van started no problem and we went to GoOutdoors to get a top up gas cannister and did the 12 miles round trip with no issues. The next day we drove approx 4 miles to a park and on the way home the van was really struggling on hills and cut out a few times giving me the dash low battery light.
I put it down to the van having been off the road for a while, charged the battery and had a couple of short runs with no further problems, until last Friday evening that is.
After getting home and doing a bit of reading and researching prices for a new alternator and discussing selling the van with my wife (again) I thought I'd have a look as I thought that I may not have tensioned the drive belt properly.
I was getting about 12.4V on the battery which dropped to around 12.2V when the van was running.
So I found this blue lead going into the alternator which I believe is the exciter wire
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... jRza0NDNkE
As you can see there is exposed copper. Could it be that the exciter wire was grounding and stopping the alternator from functioning so the van was just running from the battery? I think it would explain the gradual loss of performance as the battery ran down but I'm open to suggestions.
I re-insulated the wire and tied it up away from harm's way and things seem to be OK again and I'm getting 14V when running
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... GxQWEpVVWM
While I was fiddling about with the alternator I found this wire as well, it wasn't connected to anything...
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... 2xLYkFYWjA
but the other end was connected to the earth behind the passenger side rear light cluster
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... y1PV2txMG8
Any ideas what it would've originally been connected too?
And while you're here , I noticed this cable had become disconnected, it looks like it should be connected to a spring loaded arm on the fan housing. Anybody know what it's function is?
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... 3NtXzU2TFE
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... S1sWnJ3V3M
Many thanks in advance!!
***E D I T sorry for all the links, couldn't post the images within the body of the post!
2.0l Petrol T25 air cooled
Anyway, I'm just posting this to ask some advice to see if my theory of what went wrong is plausible.
I changed the alternator drive belt a few weeks ago and as I was putting the new belt on I felt a wire that I had to move out of the way to slip the belt onto the alternator pulley. The van started no problem and we went to GoOutdoors to get a top up gas cannister and did the 12 miles round trip with no issues. The next day we drove approx 4 miles to a park and on the way home the van was really struggling on hills and cut out a few times giving me the dash low battery light.
I put it down to the van having been off the road for a while, charged the battery and had a couple of short runs with no further problems, until last Friday evening that is.
After getting home and doing a bit of reading and researching prices for a new alternator and discussing selling the van with my wife (again) I thought I'd have a look as I thought that I may not have tensioned the drive belt properly.
I was getting about 12.4V on the battery which dropped to around 12.2V when the van was running.
So I found this blue lead going into the alternator which I believe is the exciter wire
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... jRza0NDNkE
As you can see there is exposed copper. Could it be that the exciter wire was grounding and stopping the alternator from functioning so the van was just running from the battery? I think it would explain the gradual loss of performance as the battery ran down but I'm open to suggestions.
I re-insulated the wire and tied it up away from harm's way and things seem to be OK again and I'm getting 14V when running
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... GxQWEpVVWM
While I was fiddling about with the alternator I found this wire as well, it wasn't connected to anything...
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... 2xLYkFYWjA
but the other end was connected to the earth behind the passenger side rear light cluster
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... y1PV2txMG8
Any ideas what it would've originally been connected too?
And while you're here , I noticed this cable had become disconnected, it looks like it should be connected to a spring loaded arm on the fan housing. Anybody know what it's function is?
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... 3NtXzU2TFE
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Srz ... S1sWnJ3V3M
Many thanks in advance!!
***E D I T sorry for all the links, couldn't post the images within the body of the post!
2.0l Petrol T25 air cooled