1G Alternator not charging. Battery light does not come on

boostdawd · Sep 28, 2016

Power steering killed my oem alternator. Had an old one from auto zone which I swapped for a brand new warranty replacement. I know they are crap but the weather here is in the mid 70s so I wanted to get my boost on

. Anyways I got it all hooked up but it is not putting out any charge. I'm reading 11.8v from a multimeter. The battery light in the dash does not come on at all.

Things I've checked.
Battery light bulb OK
All fuses in cabin and bay associated with Alt check out fine.
Disconnected the plug to the alternator and revved to 4k-still nothing over 11.8v

Will charging the battery full fix this? Car still turns on but leans out due to low voltage. Help me.... :idontknow:

luv2rallye · Sep 28, 2016

Test: http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/2-minute-alternator-circuit-test.226323/

boostdawd · Sep 28, 2016

Thank you rallye. I'll give this a check later this evening. On a good note I picked up a Saturn alternator for 25 bucks at the junkyard and passed at autozone. May just do a alternator rewire as they are a bit old.

boostdawd · Sep 28, 2016

Tested. Lesson learned. Never trust auto zone alternators. Swapped it with an old one that was beginning to fail from my talon and the battery light does come on. 3 hours down the drain. This sucks. I'll be setting some time to do the alternator swap. I've read the forums about it and seems simple enough. Any one out there willing to share best practices and tips?

luv2rallye · Sep 28, 2016

Check if the Saturn will fit ok. Many have said it won't fit without grinding down things (http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/saturn-alternator-swap.272646/). Also some wiring improvements may be needed (http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/important-improvements-on-saturn-alternator-swap.344794/).

The Galant alt is supposed to fit right in http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/alternator-battery-question.415719/#post-152823625().

Or get a 90 amp alternator from a turbo Canadian 1g DSM.

BloodBrother · Sep 28, 2016

2 months ago, I replaced my 1G stock alt. with a galant vr4 alt. from AutoZone, lifetime warranty. All I had to do was jack the car up to get at it from underneath, but it went in and out without having to remove anything else!

boostdawd · Sep 28, 2016

Finished installing the Saturn alternator. Took a little longer than expected and I did have to grind down a considerable amount. Heatshrinked all my connections. Black with white stripe wore to "L". Ran a 14 gauge wire to distribution block from "S". Connected the 2 white power wires to the nut on the alternator. Tension on the belt is good. Still only getting high 11 volts. Alternator whines so I'm sure its bad even though autozone said it was fine. :banghead:

boostdawd · Sep 29, 2016

Got a 99 alternator from a saturn. The pigtail was different so I rewired the cables to this harness. Battery light comes on when key is on however the alternator is still not pushing anything over 11.8v. All my fuses have been pulled and checked fine. Difference between this alternator and the other is that my battery light remains on. Probably another bad alternator. What do u guys think?

Diamondstartech · Oct 1, 2016

What were the results of the wiseman's test he linked you to above? Being that you have swapped two "known" good alternators and have relatively the same results it sounds like the problem is on you're end. I wouldn't trust auto zone very much either but I'd do a 2 minute test over 3 hours of labor any day. Download a factory service manual and read. Knowledge is the best tool here

boostdawd · Oct 1, 2016

The auto zone warranty replacement based on the test was defective out the box. The 96 Saturn alterNatori from the junk had a bad bearing and would wine horrible. The 99 alternator I recently swapped was my bad. The pigtail is different and somehow I did the wiring wrong. Re-spliced everything and now she's keeping charge. For anyone doing this mod in the future I recommend testing the wiring before reinstalling everything. Make sure the battery light comes on when the key is switched. If not the wiring may be wrong.

boostdawd · Oct 1, 2016

How do I mark this resolved?

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