Voltage regulator issues ... thank God I had a spare

[Ehab]

So yesterday, after driving 310 miles from Boston to Syracuse, the car was running nicely all along the way. As soon as I get off the highway and head to my friend's house, the car dies on me and I pull to the side of the road ...

After jump starting/charging the battery twice on the way, I was able to get it to the house where I can take it apart and look into it ...

With a voltmeter, it was obvious that there was no juice going to the battery from the alternator. I was going to replace mine (due to a grinding noise) anyway, but the new alternator hadn't arrived yet.

After inspecting the whole thing ... it was the stupid little resistor on the regulator that had broken (physically), and the wire wasn't attaced to the ceramic part any more, and hence my alternator wasn't even connected to ground ...

That is the point where I remembered that I had my old regulator, which was in ok condition, and after putting it in .... voila, it worked nicely and charged back up to 13.9 volts.

so just as a word of caution, if stuff like this happens to you, always check the regulator before you deem your alternator dead, for I had my fears, and it got me really scared and depressed about the chance that I might have to go back to Boston, get the alternator, take the 10 hour bus back to me illegally parked car, and then work on it to swap it out ...

thank God I was lucky enought to have that spare part, and wish me luck driving back home ..

E

[mlue]

I'll keep the old one as a spare.


Mark
'86 944NA