At 12:54 AM 3/14/2011, Scott Daniel  - Turbovans wrote:
>the amp meter sounds good ..
>even if it does say current is low ..
>'something' in the charging circuit is sleepy/lowish ..
>I only see those two main avenues to peruse ..
>alt/reg..........and connections and cables , assuming battery is good.

My point was that it's not likely that you're pushing much current
with 13.4 volts at the battery, but you're still dropping 400 mv
somewhere, so find out where.  Don't guess, find out.  That's why
they invented voltmeters.  It's normal to drop some in the wire, but
you're going to find out that you're dropping some at connections,
and that's not normal.  So find them and fix them, because at higher
currents they'll drop more, and they may also get hot.  If the one in
the wiring box gets hot it may melt something. And they don't all
have to be on the hot side, could also be on the ground side.  And
don't forget the battery terminals themselves - when you're measuring
battery voltage, you're doing it actually on the lead posts,
right?  And the alternator voltage you're measuring actually on the
stud?  'Cause you need to be.

Once you get that cleaned up you've got two more decisions - is the
wire big enough, and is the regulator voltage high enough.  Or
possibly do you have a leaky diode in the alternator and there's a
lot of AC ripple on the line - your *digital* voltmeter will tell you
that.  Couple hundred mv probably normal, a volt is not.  But
assuming that's ok, and you're not simply dragging down the
alternator with a huge drain, then a new regulator would be in
order.  And since by definition the 1.9l wire is too small, doubling
it up or changing to a bigger one will get the juice to the battery
better.  So will adopting the 2.1l alternator wiring scheme, where a
fat wire goes right to the starter and a skinny one over to the
wiring box to power the harness.

Yours,
d