ALTERNATOR - STARTING - HELP

[boatyboaty]

Fitted a brand new Lucas Alternator to small boat diesel engine - no
charge to batteries - wiring checked and ok - Alternator brushes and
diodes all checked out ok - some one told me you have to induce
magnetism into a new Alternator by running it under load at over 2000
revs - my engine wont go that fast - someone else told me you can
shock it - Q how what terminals etc

Cheers BB

 

[johnty]

Does your charge warning light work ?

I may be wrong , but I seem to remember that an alternator needs the charge
warning light to be working for it to work , something to do with the
inducing magnetism thing I think

Which teminal its wired to I couldnt tell you (well I could but i might be
wrong) , any car workshop manual should be able to point you in the right
direction.

Hope this helps

 

[G. Skiffington]

Hello there BB......There's just little bits of truth about certain
setups with the advice you've been given by "someones". What exact p/n
or model (prefer) Lucas alternator are you using? Can you supply a
diagram of your connection? What rpm do you normally operate and what
is
the mechanical step-up ratio to your alternator (i.e. 2:1 3:1 or actual
pulley or gearing sizes). Are the batteries chargeable (not sulphated
and/or open circuit)? One thing that I've found overlooked on marine
installs sometimes is that an alternator may be built with a floating
(not case) ground.....if so is this connected? I've also seen
situations where the pivot and adjust bracket were rubber isolated and
were also electrically isolating the case from ground.....a ground strap
was left off in this case. Is there a battery master and/or isolator
switch associated with this boat.....in some the alternator output is
routed to charge either or both or even neither (lots of variations
exist out there). What say?