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Didnt get much chance to look at it since its in storage... When it was recently moved i was let known that the charging light was on.

After taking a peak around it, everything looks fine. No noises (not from the alt, theres a small air leak above it though) no nothing, cables seem fine on quick look over.

Start the car, battery light comes on. Previously, the car sat for 3 months, I drove it for 1-1.5, parked it again outside for a few weeks before it got moved indoors by which point it was already having issues. Its been sitting since.


Thing that bothers me is that its a ford oem alternator that i got from shanahan ford back in early 2011 when i popped the old motor so its only got about 100k on it and only a few years old. I took a hammer and a bar to it and gave it a few good hits (maybe shouldve done it while it was running if it was rust on the brushes?) but no luck.


Thoughts? Ive changed an alternator on a zetec before and calling it a tight fit is an understatement so ill try other things first even if it means dancing for ten minutes while singing celine dion.

for the love of god don't sing to Celine Dion. anything but that

Just pull passenger side axle and it makes lots of space to pull it. Otherwise crack out a multimeter and see what the battery shows at idle and car off. If battery is good and charged it should show anywhere from 12v-13.2v. It takes 13.8v to charge a battery but should be closer to 14-14.5v range

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In addition to this, a bad battery and alternator show the same symptoms. How old is the battery?

(03-14-2014, 02:02 PM)GFXjamie Wrote: [ -> ]Just pull passenger side axle and it makes lots of space to pull it. Otherwise crack out a multimeter and see what the battery shows at idle and car off. If battery is good and charged it should show anywhere from 12v-13.2v. It takes 13.8v to charge a battery but should be closer to 14-14.5v range

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In addition to this, a bad battery and alternator show the same symptoms. How old is the battery?

Battery is sub 2 years old. Also from ford. Thanks for the voltage info. Ill have to write it down.

I wouldn't assume based on age usually that the battery is bad or good. Usually a load test will tell right away. If you charge the battery right up, then turn key on, lights, stereo everything and check voltage it will give you some sort of load to see how much it drops. A fully loaded battery on a load test shouldn't drop below 10-11 volts pending load put on it. With scooter batteries we consider them on their way out at 10.5 under load

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The number under load would be using a regular battery load tester aka toaster

Just so you know I had one alternator fail on me after 1 week. I also had a yellow top optima fail after 3 mths it wouldn't hold charge