Doc, As Always, I really appreciate the time you take to answer my
questions.
Fact is, the alternator is factory and never gave me any trouble that I can
remember. I don't have lots of electric stuff on my car, though I will be
installing an Holly Blue electric fuel pump soon as I get the running
to hot problem under control. This 31 year old Motorola alternator may be
an accident waiting to happen. If the swap is easy, maybe I should get the
conversion kit from Kennedy.
Charlie
In a message dated 6/14/2006 6:27:32 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
AMC74HORNET@xxxxxxxxx writes:
Charlie you said you had 40,000 miles on your car? How many times
did
you have change the alt? Mine went bad when the car was 11 months
old
and had almost 10,000 miles on it under warrantee. The dealer
installed
one lasted a week. The next one lasted 10,000 miles and when I
removed
it I found out the dealer installed a rebuilt one under warrantee.
I
installed a brand new one and every 10,000 miles it would go bad.
I
started rebuilding them myself. I did it so many times in 100,000
miles
that I could pull it, solder in a new diode trio, install 2 new
bearings
and a brush kit and have it back in the car in 1/2 hour. and for
those
sixes where it was mounted under the A/C compressor on the drivers
side
it was a chore just to take it out and put it back in. When this car
was
new with the A/C on and the radio and the lights and the wipers it
would
barely read it was charging 12 volts when it should be 14.5.
Th
headlights were dim with everything on. Everyone I know that has
an
early to mid 70's Motorola has had the same problem. I know because
I
used to make side money fixing them all. When I bought my orange car
the
first week I had it the alt. went bad and after a year with
rebuilding
my own and futzing with 3 rebuilds from different sources I went
for a
100 amp Delco. I should have done that in the first place. It is a
real
pain to install a Delco on a 6 cyl on the drivers side if you have
power
steering as there are bracket and steering box clearance problems
big
time. I had to modify the upper alt adjusting bracket. Modify
the
Motorola fan to fit the Delco, grind the Delco alt and the top of
the
steering box cover for clearance and use a belt 1/2" smaller than
stock.
Ii was well worth overcoming the problems. Now you can turn anything
on
and it charges a steady 14.4 volts. Kennedy American makes a
bracket
conversion kit to install a Deco on a V8 as long as you don't have
A/C.
It is a simple bolt on as my son had one in his
Javelin.
"Doc"
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