Two weeks ago I went for a holiday with my girlfriend's family to Pt. Victoria on the Yorke Peninsula. The first 3 days it was blistering hot weather, and on the 2nd day I took my gf and her dad for a drive around the yorke peninsula (I used to live there you see). Anyway the car was running beautifully (or so I thought) although I noticed at the first stop (Minlaton) the starter motor seemed to turn the engine just a touch slower on the first turn. I put this down to the heat (it was a 42 degree day) and the fact that I'd been running the car at 110km for 60km, and didn't think about it again. We drove further south, through Yorketown then stopped at Edithburg. Again, I noticed that it seemed a little bit sluggish on the first turn of the motor. We drove then through Coobowie and stopped at Pt. Giles to look at the large grain jetty with some rusty oil tanker sitting there. When I started it this time it was noticably more sluggish to start up. At this point I was unsure what the problem was, but figured the car would get me at least back to Pt. Victoria (now nearly 120km away). I would check everything there. The charge light wasn't on so I wasn't in any immediate danger.
Anyway, we're driving along and it's so d*mn hot that I put the air conditioner on. The car backs off a little as usual, but the air con is so d*mn nice and cold who cares?
I notice however that the fuel gauge, which I have been keeping an eye on, has moved from a touch above half to a touch below half. No problem, it has done this before. I was a touch dissappointed at the time that the car hadn't gotten at least 400km from a 1/2 tank on open highway driving, but oh well, I've had the air con on for 50% of the trip. I turn the air con off as we get into the 50 zone of Coobowie. The gauge has now fallen another millimetre or so. I now guess that it must be the slight grade causing the gauge to move around so much. I give it a touch of accelleration to see if it changes. It does - moving even further down. By the end of the Coobowie main st. the fuel gauge is on a quarter, and I look behind me to see if there's any visible fuel leak, but there isn't one. Then I notice the temperature gauge (which I hadn't looked at) was right at the cold mark. I was now worried that there was some electrical problem. As I accellerated back to the 80 zone, the car felt very sluggish. I sat at 80km in 5th, the engine purred ok at the usual 2000rpm, but the tacho was reading nearly 3000rpm!! The charge light still wasn't on so I didn't know what was happening.
At Edithburg I pulled over and opened the hood. That instant the car starting running very roughly so I told my gf to switch it off. I checked a few connections and tried to turn the engine back on again but it only just gave any sign of life,\: a very slow turnover. Then only the click of the starter solenoid. So the battery was flat? At that stage I guessed the alternator (which looked ok and hadn't been making any noise) had died. All the battery terminals were ok. We called the RAA from a nearby mechanic and he said: "The best I can do for you is tell you to get your battery charged at the mechanic's workshop and then drive the car to Pt. Victoria; try to source another alternator from there." So I did this and two hours later the battery was charged again. I put the battery back in, the car started, then died again straight away. Tried it again, and it died again, and I did this twice more until I was just about pulling my hair out!! "WHY DOES IT KEEP DYING DAMMIT!!!!" Then I opened my door (had been getting gf to start the car) and the alarm clicked. So I'd had the immobiliser on... I turned that off and it fired over beautifully. I drove back very carefully with all the electrics switched off.
About 20km before we got back I hit a huge bump which the exhaust scraped on (I was furious about this) but worse was yet to come - 4 people died there only a couple of days later. I had only been talking about "how dangerous that bl00dy road was" with my gf's parents when they showed me the paper. Two people hit head on in the same place.
Anyway back on topic - my bro got another alternator for me, for which I am very grateful. Apparently they don't make new ones any more. GRRR to that. Anyway enough ranting. I hope this post (for those who have read this far) helps anybody detect an alternator failure about to happen. The charge light didn't come on, I later found out, because the diode that blew out (I found this after looking inside the alt) also controls the charge light! If this happens to you, PLEASE, pull over in the nearest town and call the RAA, RACV, RACQ, whatever. You'll probably have to buy a new battery to get where you're going, but that's better than staying in some place you don't know.
Topic: Alternator died! Warning signs! (Read 1213 times)