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Not charging
designer - 23/10/09 at 05:01 PM

My Hood is not charging.

Generator light does not come on and no charge from Alternator

Belts are OK, gen bulb is OK,

???????????????

scootz - 23/10/09 at 05:31 PM

Hood?

Xtreme Kermit - 23/10/09 at 05:33 PM

I would advise checking all live and earth connections first. I would take them all off and clean em up before you do anything else.

designer - 23/10/09 at 05:34 PM

Hood as in Robin Hood.

scootz - 23/10/09 at 06:13 PM

quote:
Originally posted by designer
Hood as in Robin Hood.


Ah... !

02GF74 - 23/10/09 at 07:40 PM

what alternator is it?

has it ever worked or stopped just now?

bulb should have 12 V on oneend, other end goes to alternator.

does the bulb light up when engine is not running?

does the bulb remain lit when enine is running?

or dim a little bit?

are connections good - the body of the alternator is the earth.

designer - 23/10/09 at 10:19 PM

It's a Ford, with two connections (push and bolt on).

Just gone wrong, last night on A26 just south of Calais!!!

When engine power on (not running), no power on small wire when earthed (should be same voltage as battery?), bigger wire to check yet!

Bulb does not light (bulb is OK) at all

Connections seem OK.

Will start checking again tomorrow.

omega 24 v6 - 24/10/09 at 09:53 AM

quote:

When engine power on (not running), no power on small wire when earthed (should be same voltage as battery?), bigger wire to check yet!


You say the bulb is OK have you checked it???
If you ground the small wire at the alternator you should light up the bulb. If not then either you dont have an earth on the engine or chassis or wherever you ground the wire to, Or you don't have a live to the bulb or the wires to and from the bulb are broken.
You're alternator may be OK.
Also if the bulb is not lighting up how did you notice on your journey that the alternator had stopped charging?? night?? bulbs went duller gradually??

Think of it as a line diagram The small wire goes from Ignition to the bulb to the alternator. Get a good earth and check for power at the source then the bulb and finally the earth end. Use a meter if you have one and remember just because there is voltage in the wire when disconnected there may not be when it is connected. This will point to a REALLY bad or corroded connection.
Hope you get it sorted.

designer - 24/10/09 at 01:35 PM

As you can see, I am an electrical numpty!!

The bulb is definately Ok as I have tested it.

When I ground the small wire the bulb doea nor light.

The earth to the engine and alternator is OK

When it happenned the lights got dimmer and then the engine stopped. 20 miles from home!!

The red power cable is OK, can I jump the small wire somehow?

ss1turbo - 25/10/09 at 06:50 AM

If you grounded the "sense" (small) wire on the alternator with the igntion on, and the bulb didn't light, then either the bulb is blown or you have no igntion feed to the bulb - easily testable with any small multimeter. Without that 12v signal, the alternator will not charge.

You won't be able to "jump" it across, as when the alternator is in "not charging" mode, that terminal is switched to earth (and switches to 12v when it is charging). You could try it with a bulb across the two terminals on the laternator (thin wire disconnected), but i suspect that its your igntion feed to the other side of your dash light.

What you've done is run the car solely on the battery until it basically ran out of power!