'86 Westy, manual trans

As some of you may remember, I had a few problems with my van last month.
Two of the problems were 1: no voltage at blue wire for aux battery.  2:
Engine cutting out (tach going to zero, major bucking) when hitting a
bump.

I fixed the blue wire, it was broken behind the fuse panel.  After that
fix the cutting out disappeared.  IF this bare wire from the alternator
was grounding, could that have caused my cutting out issues?

My wife and I are now a week into our 5 month stay in the van for the
summer.  Things are going very well....knock on wood.

Gregor