alternator not charging ?????

[boogyman]

had to go cheap and buy a alternator from the local junk yard for my 2.3 mines a 95 and the alternator is from a 97, so i threw it on and it started right up . following morning cranked it up it ran for 20 min. and went to leave for work and died cause it drained the battery can some one chime in and help if they ve ran across this problem , thank you

 

[Earl43P]

http://www.therangerstation.com/tech_library/chargetroubleshooting.htm

http://www.therangerstation.com/tech_library/chargingsystem.htm

 

[wiesket]

Ran into a problem similar to that a year or two back.....replaced alternator.....had it checked out first a local auto parts place/was good but not charging battery.....had to replace the darn battery/had bad cell and would not hold a charge....

 

[Rackster]

Battery and Alternator

It could be that the alternator you bought was in a weakened state.

About a year ago, my wife called me after seeing 'Christmas tree lights' appearing on the dash. She got herself to the destination, but the battery died. I purchased a replacement battery and showed up to install it, but the bolt holding the battery bracket was rusted, so i couldn't get it out until the next day (I was able to jump it and get it home). I put the new battery in and thought everything was fine, for about a week. Then on Christmas Eve, I was driving the truck and saw the 'Christmas tree lights' (died in the Ford dealership parking lot). What happened to me was that the new battery was too strong for the weakened alternator that worked harder than it should have had to for a period of time (the battery was 11 years old). I had the alternator replaced (no issue going cheap by the way, because this Christmas Eve fix was over $550 dollars).

You spend what your budget allows you, but keep in mind that unless the yard has a limited return policy, you might be better off going a step deeper than you might have wanted to. Otherwise you might be rolling the dice a bit. If it wasn't Christmas Eve and I wasn't relying on the truck, I would have bought a rebuilt alternator and done the repair myself. Good luck on the repair.

Kevin

 

[fordfan]

It seems to me that if you were fine the first night, it would be your alternator? Can you do the standard test to see by: starting your truck, disconnecting the battery? If it dies it's your alternator, if it doesn't it's something else. Do you have lights? If so, maybe it's a solenoid or soemthing? Voltage regulators can be weird, I had one that would re-direct the juice to my wipers. LMAO 'cause they would go 100mph, but of course I had to replace it!