when i was driving today and turned on my turn signal, it didnt turn on. i also started noticing my headlights getting real dim. when i finally got home and tried to restart, the bat. was dead. I jumped it and ran it for a min. and turned it off and bat. was dead again. jumped again and drove around the block when the car just died, battery completely dead, had to borrow friends bat. to get back home, does this sound like a bad bat. or alt. prob? I had the alt. tested not too long ago and it was good. the bat. is a cheap valuecraft that ive had for about a year now, surprised it lasted this long, but would the bat. just go out on me like that?

 

If you have a dead cell or two yes. If you have a charger, charge it over night, remove it in the morning and see what you get for a voltage reading in the morning. It should read ~12.6V between the posts.

 

Do as suggested and test voltage after charge B-4 starting the car. Then start it and check voltage. You should have 13.5==14 volts at moderate idle.
If not, yor alternator or regulator is bad.

 

I was going to say, if you have a tester . check to see if the battery is being charged while its running. if not then the alt`s bad, or the regulator is messed up and not recharging the batt. check your ballast resistor to look at the back of it see if the ceramic back is cracked or if theres burn marks on the back of it.check for continuity from plug to plug on it too. sometimes the coil breaks in the middle.

 

Ideally you want to check the output voltage of the alt. and have the battery/alt combination load tested. You may be able to rent a load tester or a buddy may own one, than you will know fer sure.

 

Or you can check for voltage drop across the components, connections and wiring in the charging circuit. But you already knew that cause you finally broke down and bought a manual, right?

 

All of these suggestions are good, but remember this member has a limited mechanical understanding. I am not being cruel just going from previous questions and posts.

The easiest way for him to check is this: Start the car, (either from a jump or charging the battery it doesn't matter), then while the car is running dis-connect the battery. One of two things will happen, First the car will continue to run. This means everything is fine and the battery is in fact the problem. Second, the car will stall. This means the car is running off the battery and not the alternator. The only purpose of the battery is to start the car. If everything is working as it should the battery can be removed after the car is started.

Don't believe me? Try it....Go ahead I'll wait here.

 

yea did the battery wire removal and car dies, it has new alt and voltage reg. what else is there?

 

balast resistor, little white ceramic thingie on the fire wall next to the regulator. maybe a wire not connected all the way on the alt or reg. loose terminal blade on the alt. where the wire clips on if its loose it willnot send voltage. or wire loose to the hot lead of the alt. if teh wiring is old, then could be broken between alt to reg. or reg. to ballaast. etc. check for continuity with ohm. meter between each item. Jut becausse its new doesnt mean its good ither, a budy was doing some wiring yesterday , i helped him and now current from toggle to lights, replaced toggle it worked. I took the togg. out of the box wraped new part. was bad.the alt. may have checked good a few months ago. doesnt mean it didnt go bad since then. just tryin to help.

 

It is not the battery.

Now, here we go again. I am going to tell you the same thing I have told you before. You can start throwing parts at it guessing or you can take it to a shop to diagnose it and pay just a couple bucks and know exactly what it is. But it is NOT the battery. And it is not the ballast resistor.

Understand, you don't have to pay them to fix it just for the diagnosis, Then they are on the hook when it is wrong.


Good luck.

 

Just a SWAG BUT even tho you replaced alt. pull it and get it checked..Most chain parts stores does this for free other than the time and labor to remove, if it checks ok I would replace the regulator again. (even tho it 'new' also).. just MHO....

 

X2

 

well if you happen to have access to a charging system tester, lol give that a try

 

i did test the alt. when i got it, was good, got a alt/bat. tester and with the car on it was running 12, a little above.

 

should be higher than that, (13 -13.5) would be more like it.
do you still have the original type regulator (that came with car).
I have learned that the guys testing the parts at say, auto zone, dont always know what the hell they are doing. Yeah they might say it is charging good, but how good? And cheaply rebuilt alts. dont last long sometimes. Ya gets what ya pays fer. But, I know your out there in the country so that makes getting stuff more of a challenge and not too much moola to play with but I'm still thinking alt and /or its connections.