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785sp 785sp is offline
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Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: LA County
Posts: 53
Hey Eddie, let me save you some trouble.

I have basically your car and have had the exact same issues. I went through four "rebuilt" alternators in 15K miles. For the last one, I went to my oil-change guy (for the wife's car) and said "Where would you send out an alternator to be rebuilt if you absolutely had to make sure it was an A+ job?" He directed me to a local shop that's mostly industry walk-ins. I went there, chatted with the guys, and when they realized what kind of stock, alternator I had (which I had purchased at full "rebuilt" price from a reputable 928 supplier), they started to hedge and said they'd have to "consult" with their parts supplier. Eventually, they replied that they could re-build it properly, but they needed a couple of special parts, at a little more cost. Now, I know what you're thinking, that I was just being hosed an extra 50 bucks, but guess what: it's worked perfectly ever since. The bottom line, I suspect, is that the stock alternators have some parts that are not always replaced in the run-of-the-mill rebuild, and those are the parts that often fail. So, either you hunt down a rebuilt shop on your own and make them do it right, or you find a pricey "totally new" alternator (if such a thing exists--I've been told that the "new" alternators are probably rebuilds anyway), or you convert to an ACDelco or something else that's more standard.

Also, I still haven't solved the exciter-wire problem, but letting the older 928 models sit at idle for hours is a terrible idea anyway (unless you like loud explosions), so that's probably a minor issue all things considered.
Old 01-07-2009, 02:30 PM
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