David Neibert
SCCoA Admin
Drove my 93 SC (turbo v8) to work a couple days ago to see how well the water wetter is working. On the way home I started having a string of strange things happen.
First part of the drive I was stuck in traffic idling for about 20 minutes and it started raining. When I turned on the wipers they seemed to be moving unusually slow. Then after getting onto the highway and up to cruising speed the Antilock brake light comes on..couple miles further down the road the radio suddenly shuts off, then the display on the radio comes on but no sound from the speakers.
Shortly afterward the VMM display starts flashing off and on then goes blank, a couple miles further down the road and my electronic boost controller display starts beeping and flashing then it shuts off. About a mile from home I pull up to a stop sign and can't see the reflection of my running lights from the car in front of me, but I can see them with the turn signal on. Half mile from home the motor starts sputtering and missing like it's running out of fuel, but the tank was just filled that morning. At this point it obvious that I've got a fairly serious electrical problem, and I shut off the wipers and running lights to conserve power.
I manage to keep the motor running by playing with the throttle and got the car into my driveway but don't have a remote opener in this car, so I honked the horn so my wife would open the door. Horn didn't work, so I put it in park and got out to open the door (raining pretty hard now) and the damn thing stalls. I get out and open the hood and everything looks normal and the new DCC Mrk 8 fan is blowing at full speed sucking the remianing life out of the battery. Tried restarting the motor and it barely cranked and then stopped and made a rapid clicking sound indicating a nearly dead battery.
Haven't had time to swap the alternator yet, but I did put it on a battery maintainer/trickle charger and even after being on the charger for over 48 hours it still isn't showing a full charge. Thinking the alternator is toast and may actually be pulling power with the car turned off. Even though it wasn't showing to be fully charged the car fired right up last night and everything was working fine. Checked the voltage and was only getting 12.0 volts at the battery and the alternator output. When shut off I'm showing 1.87 amps of load on the battery.
About a month or two ago I had the battery light come on at night while sitting at a stop light. When I gave it a little gas the light went off and never came back on. When I got home I checked the voltage and was only getting around 11.5 volts at idle, but 13 plus at 1500 rpms. I also found that one of the two main power wires from the 3g alternator had a broken terminal ring and the exposed hot wire was nearly touching the alternator case. I replaced the terminal lug and reattached the cable. The low voltage at idle was bugging me, but the battery always seemed to have plenty of power so I just ignored it and kept on driving the car. I'm now wondering if that broken power cable may have touched the alternator case and shorted out something in the alternator.
Weird thing was, the battery light never came on.
David
PS: Car never got over 185 and the fan kept working the entire time.
First part of the drive I was stuck in traffic idling for about 20 minutes and it started raining. When I turned on the wipers they seemed to be moving unusually slow. Then after getting onto the highway and up to cruising speed the Antilock brake light comes on..couple miles further down the road the radio suddenly shuts off, then the display on the radio comes on but no sound from the speakers.
Shortly afterward the VMM display starts flashing off and on then goes blank, a couple miles further down the road and my electronic boost controller display starts beeping and flashing then it shuts off. About a mile from home I pull up to a stop sign and can't see the reflection of my running lights from the car in front of me, but I can see them with the turn signal on. Half mile from home the motor starts sputtering and missing like it's running out of fuel, but the tank was just filled that morning. At this point it obvious that I've got a fairly serious electrical problem, and I shut off the wipers and running lights to conserve power.
I manage to keep the motor running by playing with the throttle and got the car into my driveway but don't have a remote opener in this car, so I honked the horn so my wife would open the door. Horn didn't work, so I put it in park and got out to open the door (raining pretty hard now) and the damn thing stalls. I get out and open the hood and everything looks normal and the new DCC Mrk 8 fan is blowing at full speed sucking the remianing life out of the battery. Tried restarting the motor and it barely cranked and then stopped and made a rapid clicking sound indicating a nearly dead battery.
Haven't had time to swap the alternator yet, but I did put it on a battery maintainer/trickle charger and even after being on the charger for over 48 hours it still isn't showing a full charge. Thinking the alternator is toast and may actually be pulling power with the car turned off. Even though it wasn't showing to be fully charged the car fired right up last night and everything was working fine. Checked the voltage and was only getting 12.0 volts at the battery and the alternator output. When shut off I'm showing 1.87 amps of load on the battery.
About a month or two ago I had the battery light come on at night while sitting at a stop light. When I gave it a little gas the light went off and never came back on. When I got home I checked the voltage and was only getting around 11.5 volts at idle, but 13 plus at 1500 rpms. I also found that one of the two main power wires from the 3g alternator had a broken terminal ring and the exposed hot wire was nearly touching the alternator case. I replaced the terminal lug and reattached the cable. The low voltage at idle was bugging me, but the battery always seemed to have plenty of power so I just ignored it and kept on driving the car. I'm now wondering if that broken power cable may have touched the alternator case and shorted out something in the alternator.
Weird thing was, the battery light never came on.
David
PS: Car never got over 185 and the fan kept working the entire time.