03-03-2021, 08:16 AM
About 6 months ago my alternator quit working. It is 39 years old, and the odds were it would happen someday. As you know, having a functional alternator on a mechanical diesel engine like the Detroit Diesel 6v92 (what we have) is not a necessity, and, in fact, I drove almost 2,000 miles without it before having it rebuilt while we were visiting Tom and Darlene last month. The removal took about 20 minutes, and Tom and I delivered it to Turbo and Electric of Phoenix later that same morning for rebuild. They warned it could take two weeks, or more, but it was done in just 8 days at a cost of $542. They are the same people who rebuilt my brother-in-laws Leece-Neville off his 1984 Newell a year ago.
The reinstall was easy, taking just 40 minutes with a two minute assist from my wife, Elaine. Once this was done I installed the new digital tachometer from Speedhut I wrote about recently. I ran the engine for a few minutes after reinstalling the alternator, and it worked as it should. We left Tom and Darlene's this past Sunday (2/28/21) to head to Yuma for dental appointments. About 60 miles out of Wittmann the alternator quit working. Of course, my mind goes to dark places when things stop working, and I wondered if I had made an error while reinstalling it.
The next day (Monday) we drove the final 20 miles to the Mexican border crossing and it was still not working. After returning from our dental appointments I once again removed the alternator (in the parking lot) to be sure all was well. This is a gear driven alternator, and you must engage the two shafts properly when reconnecting everything. I was able to confirm pretty quickly all was well, and I had installed it correctly, but still it would not put out any electricity. I attached a multi-meter to the positive and negative terminals, and turned on the engine again to find ZERO volts. At first I thought something internally had failed again, but then I realized that there should be some sort of reading on the multi-meter as that positive cable goes to the batteries, right? Then I remembered there are two 90 amp breakers in the rear electrical panel....one for the batteries, and one for.....you guessed it.....the alternator. I first pressed the red battery breaker button to find it was fine. Then I pushed hard on the alternator button, and heard an audible CLICK.....that fixed the problem.
More often than not it is something simple, and not catastrophic.....one of these days I'll learn that lesson....I hope.
The reinstall was easy, taking just 40 minutes with a two minute assist from my wife, Elaine. Once this was done I installed the new digital tachometer from Speedhut I wrote about recently. I ran the engine for a few minutes after reinstalling the alternator, and it worked as it should. We left Tom and Darlene's this past Sunday (2/28/21) to head to Yuma for dental appointments. About 60 miles out of Wittmann the alternator quit working. Of course, my mind goes to dark places when things stop working, and I wondered if I had made an error while reinstalling it.
The next day (Monday) we drove the final 20 miles to the Mexican border crossing and it was still not working. After returning from our dental appointments I once again removed the alternator (in the parking lot) to be sure all was well. This is a gear driven alternator, and you must engage the two shafts properly when reconnecting everything. I was able to confirm pretty quickly all was well, and I had installed it correctly, but still it would not put out any electricity. I attached a multi-meter to the positive and negative terminals, and turned on the engine again to find ZERO volts. At first I thought something internally had failed again, but then I realized that there should be some sort of reading on the multi-meter as that positive cable goes to the batteries, right? Then I remembered there are two 90 amp breakers in the rear electrical panel....one for the batteries, and one for.....you guessed it.....the alternator. I first pressed the red battery breaker button to find it was fine. Then I pushed hard on the alternator button, and heard an audible CLICK.....that fixed the problem.
More often than not it is something simple, and not catastrophic.....one of these days I'll learn that lesson....I hope.
Clarke and Elaine Hockwald
1982 Newell Classic, 36', 6V92 TA
2001 VW Beetle Turbo
Cannondale Tandem
Cannondale Bad Boy
Haibike SDURO MTB
http://whatsnewell.blogspot.com
