Correct, I forgot to pump them up but he passed it anyway rather than pass me an air line. And the new reg plates were both on the dash as I've run out of double sided tape. He knows I don't go on the road to get home and that my alternator is playing up so not likely to go far before I fix these small matters. @Fish The alternator light dims now when I give it a few revs which it didn't initially, but meanwhile this has no effect on the voltage read across the battery doing exactly the same. Is that a clue? It won't start again today now I've given back the mahoosive battery starter blaster thing I borrowed earlier - more of that on the resto thread later. Battery on charge. Damn, I didn't have the stereo on.
I gave a friend my best spare alternator last weekend! Sods law. I still have another but it's hanging with insulation melted off stuff inside so that's deffo no good but could be a brush donor if it's as simple as that, assuming it has better ones. If I borrowed a regulator off another van, is there any chance something amiss would break it? I wouldn't want to try it if there's any chance, I wouldn't be popular.
I used to maintain piston powered 'Islander' aircraft years (40) ago at Lagos in Nigeria. When I arrived on the operation, I saw a bench full of Alternators with U/S labels on them, and asked what the problem was with them. The pilots had written then up in the Tech. log as being noisy, drives the poor dears crazy listening to the failed Diode whining for hours in their headsets. What we didn't tell them, was that when we didn't have a serviceable spare available, we would recycle the oldest unit from our ' 'unserviceable' bench. I had this problem for years on my bus, it didn't bother me much, the battery still charged, just it was not completely rectified AC. Tony
@zed does the other van run? you could out your regulator in that and see if it is ok? rather than knacking theirs in yours?
Yes it does. So my possibly knacked regulator would hurt their van for a minute? It's going to be a tomorrow thing now it's getting dark and been a long lead up to the MOT. I've just finished a bottle of Highland Park 12 year old and it's not even 5pm yet Tut-tut I'm quite ashamed.
shouldnt do, if your alternator is knackered and its blown your regulator then it will do the same to the other reg, but the other way round, if your reg is u/s then it shouldnt affect the other vans alternator. at least you will know if your reg is ok or not. could it be the alternator has lost its "excitement" and it needs a zap to get it going?
I should have restored the fecker before I fitted it. Having looked a bit further into the spare one and found melted insulation and stuff + having to replace the main wire on the one i fitted it was pretty silly not to take it to bits first.
But I will do the reg swap first thing tomorrow before I take Alt out - it comes out easy enough, but not as easy as the reg. BTW I checked the exhaust while it was running on the MOT ramp and stopped the exhaust leak - one pot just needed the merest tweek to be as tight as the others. Satisfying to stop the noise in real time.
On the other hand I should be doing something tonight to get ahead. What does the team think I should do first?
Dont sit down and have a smoke whilst you think about it If your anything like me you will find your brew has gone cold and you have spent ten mins staring into space
If I completely unplug the alternator and have all the wires dangling out of the engine hatch inc the main one, is there is something I can measure? Or if I leave the main one attched to the starter and measure off the Reg lead??
Measure of the reg lead Actually I am not sure what you are supposed to get out of the alt on that lead, best not to do it until someone else confirms what you should see
