Electrical Problem?

[germanyt]

I hooked up my 200 amp alternator and used a 1/0 awg power wire and 1/0 awg ground from battery to chassis on top of the stock ground. I had an Optima Red Top hooked up but I'm wonder if the alternator is too much for the battery. It runs fine once I get it started so I don't think its the alternator and no fuses or lights have blown so I don't think it's the voltage regulator either, but the battery won't hold a charge. My dome light only has to be on for like 10 minutes and the car won't start. I swapped it with a lead/acid battery and am waiting to see if there are any problems with it. Anybody got any ideas on what the problem could be?

[PaulD]

set the regualtor voltage to 14V or less ....... Optimas don't like the higher voltage

[germanyt]

alright, i thought it might have been my voltage regulator so i brought out the fluke multimeter and checked it. here are the results

at idle with no lights, guages lit, or heater on: 13.4 volts
at idle with everything on: 12.36 volts
2000 rpm with everything off: 13.6 volts
2000 rpm with everything on: 12.8 volts
3000 rpm with everything off: 14.76 volts
3000 rpm with everything on: 13.84 volts

so iim thinking that the 14.76 volts killed my optima. these voltages were taken with a 2 1/2 year old exide with less cca and ca than the red top. im gonna run this one and see if it works well. but if it kills the exide too. what would be a good battery that would not get damaged by close to 15 volts?

[germanyt]

so it turns out it wasnt the voltage that killed the battery. i put the exide in and it died too. come to find out that there is something wrong with the alternator. at idle it was only putting out like 15 amps which went up drastically at 200 rpm over idle. just 200 more rpm jumped the alt to 85 amps. i emailed db electrical and they are sending me a new one with postage to send the bad one back. im a little shaky on the product as of now but they have great customer service. sending me a new one before i send the bad one back.....wow. dont see that too much. but anyway, this is why the car kept dying after about 10-15 min at idle. just a little update

[PaulD]

what you may need is a slightly smaller pulley wheel on the alternator, it will make it spin a little faster at idle

[germanyt]

Originally Posted by PaulD

what you may need is a slightly smaller pulley wheel on the alternator, it will make it spin a little faster at idle

i had considered that but what happens when i rev to say, 2500 rpm. the output gets affected greatly. i was thinking that if the next one has the same problem that i would call a shop and see if they can change my idle rpm through my computer. new alt should be here today or tomorrow so ill see.

[PaulD]

I have the same idle current in my crx ...... let me know what happens, cuz I wanna start redoing the whole system sometime this year