Quote:
Originally Posted by 327chevy
While driving my truck this evening I noticed the amp gauge was showing discharge signaling perhaps a fault in the alternator.I got to my destination without issue,shut the truck off,started it later to head home.The gauge read normal for a couple of minutes then showed discharge again and stayed that way til I got home.Once I got home I left the engine running and got my volt metre,put the probes across the battery posts and sure enough the metre was reading only 12.8 volts.I shut the engine off,restarted it and measured the voltage drop again,14.6vdc,hmm.
The battery is only about 4 months old and is the heavier duty GM one so I'm thinking that part is fine so this leads me to believe the alternator has something funky going on inside it.
My truck isn't a daily driver,I walk to work and only drive the truck a couple of times a week normally.This issue with the amp gauge showing discharge had cropped up once before but went away and I never thought of it again until tonight.
Any thoughts?I was thinking of pulling it off tomorrow night after work,popping it apart and seeing if maybe there's just some corrosion that needs to be cleaned up,if I'm lucky.Just how big a job is it to take one of these alternators apart?I've had lots of the older ones apart,it seemed like I was changing diode trios and regulators every time I turned around.
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with your vehicle you may have the fuel saving alternator setup. see if this vehicle has this . now when the discharge shows up put the ac on to max ,headlights on to create a larger electrical load .. if the alternator now shows a charge then you are ok. this is normal..
on first starting this discharge should never show... that is not normal..
GM did this to increase MPG at the expense of the battery and the alternator..