Help! everything died... alternator?
 

Hey everyone,

well, i'm back after a couple of years of having the Porsche sit in the garage for the past years.

Anyways, fixed it all up for this summer and has been pretty good for the past month or so.

A couple of weeks ago, while driving, I noticed the tac needle jumping and hanging around over the 7000 mark. The car was also not running really well and was sputtering a little. After driving for 15 minutes or so, everything just died and left me stranded on the side of the road. Got a boost from a cab and drove it home. Put the charger on it and charged it for the night.

The next day, it started right up and have been driving it since... until tonight!

Again, same sort of thing. I noticed the tac needle jumping and then just died. Then I turned on the headlights, and the radio went off... Not a good thing I figured so I turned around and started heading home. Well too late, the flashers stopped working and the card died again on the side of the road. I ended up buying a battery booster since the last time so I put that on and then everything came back! Started the car and headed home.

The car is back in the garage but now I have no idea what to do.

Any ideas? I suspect a faulty alternator. What about the voltage regulator? or battery perhaps?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
Shayne

what year? was the radio making a funny noise over the speakers?

sorry about that... 1981 SC

Nope, no noise from the radio that I can recall.

Check and see if the car works now. Same thing happened to me with my 81SC when I was exiting a parking garage. Boy was that embarrassing. Everything was electrically dead. I called John Walker and he told me to check my battery connections. I lifted the hood and they looked fine, but I wiggled the positive one a little. I went back to the driver's seat and the car started right up. He told me if everything was dead, it had to be the battery.

Replace the battery......

Thanks... I'll pull the battery and bring it in to have it tested.

Shayne

The jumpy tach needle is a classic symptom of alternator failure. Before replacing the battery, check the alternator. If it's bad, you could cook a new battery.

I don't know if your year car has an external regulator, but if it does that could be the problem as well, so you should also check the regulator.

Thanks guys...

I just brought in the battery at the local store and had it checked. Test came back as GOOD.

Something else I noticed was that the VDO and Oxygen Lights are on when the car is idling.

Yes, I'm pretty sure the regulator is external.

thanks
Shayne

As you fiddle with batteries, connections, regulators, radios, ground wires etc. etc. etc. remember these 3 words:

ALTERNATOR,
ALTERNATOR; and
ALTERNATOR.

Been there, done that - several times.;););)

yep, figured. I just stopped into a local Porsche shop here and suspect a bad alternator as well... wow, they're not cheap!

how hard & how much labor to change the alternator? is it worth having the shop do it. They quoted about 3 hours of labor.

thanks
Shayne

A couple of things:

1. Make sure the shop properly tests the alternator to see if that really IS the issue. Have them provide the results.

2. Gte a second opinion - AMA or AAA, if you're a member. They tested mine - correctly!

3. You can do it, but it's a time consuming job and you have to take a lot of stuff off to get at it. If the shop says 3 hours, that's about right. If you do it, count on at least a Saturday morning's worth. And, have a technically knowlegable buddy available to help.

4. You should be able to get a Bosch rebuild for a decent price.

I just replaced the regulator on my car...a 5 minute job a technically retarded person like me can do easily. It's a $40 trial to fix it. It worked on mine; jumpy tach gone and generator light doesn't come on while driving now.