Alternator keeps going out

[White Wolf]

I have replaced the alternator on my mothers 96 aerostar five times in the past six or seven months. We have bought them from a couple of different chain part supply stores. Put them in myself. Worked great for a couple of weeks to a month each. Then stared going dead again. We currently believe the problem is a short. However are not certain where to start looking. There have been problems with both the radio and the windshield wipers. Would paareciate anyone's ideas on where to start on repairing this problems. Thanks.

[vitalmuncie]

get one with a lifetime wrrantee. also check to see if anything is near it that would leak on it radiator,oil,etc. the wiring is another issue to look at, for example on a ford taurus I installed 4 starters in 4 years and found that the battery cable went straight to it, then I looked at a wiring diagram that shows the battery cable goes to the other corner of the engine compartment on the fusebox and through 2 fusible links that are wired parralel to each other then to the starter. it was backwards.

[gacowboy30]

Not familiar with older model fords, but I had a very similar situation years ago with a pontiac grand prix. After about 6-8 random failures of new alternators, I had narrowed it down to something randomly shorting when I was starting the car. What I found was there was a metal rod that moved downward with the turn of the key. That rod had some kind of small circuit board attached at the other end with several contacts inside that it ran across when the key was turned. The contacts were very burned from years of sparking and was causing the random short which in turn was frying the diodes in the alternator. Again, not sure if ford has a similar setup, but thought I would throw that out there just in case it may help you. I know how aggravating random issues can be.

[vitalmuncie]

difficult to find any activity on this forum. the grand prix issue may have been for the shifter lockout or something of that kind.