[Damo]

Was working on a zook yesterday that has me a bit puzzled.

It's got a 1.6 swap in it with a 16v engine. The alternator is connected to the battery, but the big green plug is not connected. I thought this plug had 2 wires in it, one for the alternator light on the dash, and one to excite the field windings in the alternator (eg, to turn it on). Have I got this totally wrong?

If i'm right then how the hell is this thing charging? It's been driving for ages with that plug disconnected.

[royce]

older alternators used the power from the warning light to excite the diodes and start charging, on newer ones its just a warning light and doesnt need to be hooked up at all

the other wire is the voltage sense and tells the reg what the battery voltage is to adjust to suit, so either it thinks the voltage is 0 and is running flat out all the time or works off the voltage on the charge stud or something?

just bung some scotch loks in and she'll be right

[want33s]

Some alternators "SELF EXCITE"..
Sounds like yours is doing it..

[Damo]

want33s wrote:

Some alternators "SELF EXCITE"..
Sounds like yours is doing it..

Seems like that's the most likely scenario.

It's working though, i'll look into it further once I have the rest of the disaster sorted!