[Vwdiesel] '82 Jetta charging issue

[George Allison]

Great, thanks to all, those are great tips! Sounds like I'll get it
worked out. An adjustable regulator is an interesting idea, but I feel
like before I put one of those in to crank up the voltage, I should
first figure out why my alternators keep dying (unless it's just
because they're crappy rebuilds) and why the voltage is low in the
first place... that way I won't blow something up when I pump it up to
14v with a manual regulator.

I'm betting I will find an issue with the wiring... I checked the grounding pretty thoroughly while stranded for a day in Denver CO over the summer and found no trouble there, but I did find that only one of the two big red charging wires coming out of the plug had continuity with the + side of the battery, which is clearly a problem. Probably will have to do something like building a new harness... Doesn't sound like fun to me, I hate electricals, but I guess since this is the only real important electrical system on the whole car (!) I can live with it...

The alternator I had that blew up had not been assembled right... the shaft didn't run true, and the throughbolts holding the whole thing together weren't tight. The story is a pretty crazy one. I installed it in Denver, and it started loosening up by the time I had crossed into Utah without me noticing. It quit charging as I was about to enter Zion National Park (probably because the mechanical looseness had caused things to hit each other inside or something), so I knew it was bad, but I decided to just unplug and book it for California, still not realizing it wasn't tight. Made it as far as Baker, CA, and it was getting dark and I was starting to get scared driving across the dark Mojave desert after Vegas with no lights, so I'd had them on. I started to hear a weird buzzing/clanking from under the hood, and pulled off in Baker to see what it was. Looked in there and the whole back of the alternator was vibrating and dancing all around, and I saw the bolts working their way out... but it was only a few more hours to LA (on a trip that started in Vermont, that didn't sound like much -- the home stretch!). I knew I couldn't turn off the engine because the battery was too flat to restart it, so I decided to just go for it. Got as far as the I-15 entrance ramp, and BAM the whole thing blew... one of the bolts worked its way out and caught in the blades of the alt fan, and then the whole thing self-destructed from there. That was when I called AAA, and called it a night. The NAPA store where I returned the remaining pieces of that sorry thing was pretty embarrassed... now the bearings are squeaking in the replacement they gave me, so I guess I'm gonna be redeeming that lifetime warranty again until I get a good one.

Thanks for all the help!

George

On 2/6/08, LBaird119 at aol.com <LBaird119 at aol.com> wrote:
> In a message dated 2/6/2008 7:22:49 AM Pacific Standard Time,
> vwdieselbunny at yahoo.com writes:
>
> > On the Corrado list, a popular alternator mod is the
> > Transpo Adjustable Voltage Regulator.  The part number
> > they use on the Corrado G60 (which should fit on a lot
> > of Bosch Rabbit alternators--in fact after a pulley
> > change, I had a Corrado alternator on a Rabbit for
> > awhile) looks like IB373A.  I guess you can turn the
> > voltage output up to nearly 15 volts if you want.
> >
> > When I went back and searched the email for
> > information, I found one email talking about an issue
> > with fatigued rivits and a resulting wire break, but
> > that was the only complaint, the rest is all good.
> >
>
>   Here's one I bookmarked some time back:
> http://davebarton.com/AdjustableVoltage.html
>      Loren
>
>
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