The Penny Drops

[Brett Dikeman]

At 8:58 AM -0700 9/13/02, Fisher, Scott wrote:
>Huw answers Tommy Tow from Fairfield, California:
>
>>  The alternator is a device for turning motion into electrical current.
>>  it does this by spinning an electromagnet <---
>
>The key word here being "electromagnet" -- meaning, I assume, that if you
>stop applying current to the electromagnet, it stops turning motion into
>electrical current.  Yes?

Yes.  If the field wire is cut or damage(or looses power), the
alternator becomes a spinning paperweight.


>The traffic finally made it to I-80 and I started zooming up to speed.
>Suddenly at high RPMs the engine cut out.  I dropped the revs and continued,
>thinking something had gotten fouled or gummed in the heat/stop-and-go.
>Tried again, more cutout (where "cutout" means "the whole car shook and
>shuddered as though being hit by automatic 20mm cannon fire")


What was the voltage during all of this?


>I called for a tow truck (mainly to see if jump-starting solved my problem;
>if it did, I was across the parking lot from a Sears, suggesting an easy
>remedy) and Tommy Tow shows up in decent time.  He hooked up one of the
>neatest toys I've seen in a long time: a little lunchbox-sized jump-starter.
>I gotta get one.  The Coupe roared to life, but when Tommy disconnected the
>jump-starter it started to die again.
>
>"Y'oughta get your alternator looked at," sez Tommy.  "Car oughta run if you
>take the battery OUT once it starts."

Wrong.

Look in any race car and you'll see a small gel-cell.  In the pits
somewhere is a normal-sized battery with a quick-disconnect plug.

Your battery was fried, possibly due to a malfunctioning voltage
regulator, but also possibly due to a battery failure.

Keep a close eye on everything...

Brett
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