Last x Days Posts  1 | 3 | 7 Days  Search  Topics  Tree View  Help
  Soarer Central * Electrical * Very strange alternator/ regulator / battery fault, TT Previous Previous    Next Next  

Author Message
David Henderson
TryHard
Nsw
TT

Posts: 364
Reg: 08-2007

Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message

Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!)

Friday, February 28, 2014 - 09:04 pm, by:  David Henderson (Hendo) Quote hilighted text Edit Post Delete Post Print Post   View Post/Check IP (Moderator/Admin Only) Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Hi all.
I just had a very interesting fault show up. I'm driving up to Coffs Harbour from Sydney, 3 hours in and doing what I thought was just over the limit (110 zone I thought) I get the dreaded blue lights. It's an 100 zone, not a 110. Clocked me at 118. $250 later, I set off on my journey- well tried, anyway.

The car wouldn't start. It'd been 5 mins or so, headlights on, fan on, engine off (didn't want a zorst defect). The dash was dim and it would not turn over, or even click. Luckily, I had jumper cables. Unluckily, the police man wouldn't help. He was polite, but couldn't help due to the electrical gear in his car.

Next we tried a push start. Slight uphill gradient but not too extreme. Got her started, but the dash was still dim, it ran like a dog- requiring revs to keep her alive, but the dash kept fading I till it would run but not rev. It was extra strange because the dash was illuminated with a few lights I've never seen- TRC light was on, though it's not fitted (pov pack tt)

My prognosis was that either the alternator had failed and wasn't charging the battery, or the battery had dropped multiple cells and wouldn't hold any charge at all.

So the wife and I walked to the nearest servo, which was mercifully only a few hundred meters away. I wanted to buy a battery and hope it survived the trip or at least got us to a major center (tarree). I have no NRMA cover...

So the servo didn't sell batteries. In desperation I asked a few randoms, after a few tries a car full of young blokes and girls offered to help. I had jumper leads and figured I could probably jump enough charge into the battery to get us to the town center- well the servo anyway.

We drove to the car and decided we'd push it to the nearest side street (100m) to safely jump start it. I put the key in to unlock the steering wheel and the dash lit up, bright as. Tried to crank, clicked away, but wouldn't start. While pushing it to the side street I jumped in and try one last roll start- and she fired straight up! Even idled, with none of the hesitation usually evident after an ecu reset.

We were blown away. We'd resided ourselves to the fact that we'd be sleeping in the car or adding another couple of hundred dollars to the nights $250 tab so far.

I thanked the p platers, then the driver handed me a flyer for his local church, I thanked him and mentioned something about divine intervention, lols were had. He didn't look like the type- boardies, blue singlet cruising in his commodore with his mates and girls, I guess I shouldn't jus the a book by its cover.

I digress. I'm 2 hours further north now (nearly at kempsey) and the car is doing fine. I'm trying to reason out what may have happened- any ideas? Could have turning the car off after a long freeway section caused heat soak and made the regulator temporarily fail? It had been raining, maybe a plug was full of water in the reg feedback loop?

One more thing to add to my chronicle. This is the FIRST break down in 8 years of owning the Soarer, I've done 50+ trips from syd to coffs, and this is also the FIRST time I haven't bought my tools. Cheers, Murphy

Add Your Message Here
Eye Candy
Click for full size
Bold text Italics Underline Center Text Upload photo from your hard drive Make a List Make a Table Make an Image Thumbnail Create a hyperlink Insert a clipart image Formatting Help
         

Username: Important Posting Information:
If asking a question, have you done a search to see if your question has already been answered?
Be aware that the use of SMS-speak eg "u" instead of "you" etc, will get your post deleted.
Password:
Enable HTML code in message
Automatically activate URLs in message

  Administration Administration      Log Out Log Out Previous Previous      Next Next