My alternator spikes to 19V. Check it out.

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better watch that man. we bought a new alt for the dweetmobile and it was pushing 18.4 volts. was blowing headlights out left and right before we finally figured it was the alt.

 

Yeah, I was worried too. So i found my old alternator which has a bad coil, and I swapped out the voltage regulator.

The screws were stuck so I ended up using a dremmel to turn the phillips screws into flathead screws.


I unsoldered the wires using a soldering iron and a mega-boost from a small blow torch


It worked well! It's a bit high because it's charging. I drained my battery a bit while I was working.

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You know you didn't have to unsolder all the big wires on the rectifier side right? Mine was 3 bolts +1 solder joint and the regulator was off.

Did you dress the brushes at all? I used some fine sandpaper on a AA battery and some IPA to clean mine up, but they needed it due to less-than-gentle handling.

 

From the schematics I can't tell for sure, but are you sure that was the voltage regulator and not just the brushes?

I cleaned the post and the brushes with electrical cleaner, but I was not going to risk

messing up the contact surface by cleaning it. Even if it is just a little.

 

On our cars' alternators, the plastic part holds the brushes, their braided wires and springs, *and* the regulator. The stuff on the other side (the not-plastic parts on the back of the alternator) varies in appearance, from "holy **** made in china" to "hey nice heat sink you got there" but the basic idea is a half-dozen diodes for the regulator to get DC it can use.

I only found out a AA battery is the right size AFTER the counter jockey said my regulator wasn't making any output voltage at all. If you get the brushes even a little bit out of shape, the sliprings won't be in electrical contact. Spray-on cleaner is probably your best bet unless you don't care what happens to the alternator.

For those who are curious, here is a primer on how an alternator works. If you don't understand basic electricity, this may be a bid over your head, but here it is: http://www.alternatorparts.com/under...lternators.htm

Misc. rectifier pictures: http://www.nationsautoelectric.com/rectifiers.html

 

howabout voltage regulators? know any sources for tiburons?

 

I would call Texas Alternator & Starter Service (I think that's their name), the local shop in Austin if I thought I needed a regulator. . . but I think my spare alternator on the garage shelf has good electronics.

 

I think the one which I just swapped in has a problem. It seems to slowly regulate the voltage to off until I give it a good rev. I will check around first, but I will keep that in mind

 

After a few days my regulator started dieing, but the other way, it decreases in power rather then increases. I decided to rebuild my Alternator. I got onto HyundaiPartsOnline.com and ordered 2 bearings and 2 voltage regultors.

I also ordered 2 bearings.