China makes decent quality parts, and Mexicans do a decent job of assembling parts too, so at least in my experience, I'm not worried. The old "Buy American" patrotism (meaning Buy Made in USA), doesn't hold up nowadays, everything is made in China anyway. (by the way, Mexico is part of "America", Central America in this case, from Canada to Argentina, everyone is "American". And some archaeologists say that the ancient civilizations in Central and South America (Mayas, Aztecs, and Incas), were actually of Asian origin, figure that one for me.

 

Told me what? I knew the alternator was defective and was mainly looking for information regarding compatibility. However, the info about upgrading was very informative and I plan on doing that on my next Aerostar. I probably have a lightly used remanufactured Ford or aftermarket alternator that would fit and work good but time was becoming an issue. My shop is too far from home and then finding it among everything would have taken too much time also. I was just hoping to put something to use that wasn't getting used.....


I have been involved with all aspects of auto repair going on 13 years and know the game very well. If this van was something I plan on keeping long term I would have it rebuilt locally at a rebuild shop I deal with. Quality rebuild parts (not always American made but usually) can still be found but the price turns most people away. The alternator I got from Advance is 100% new and made in China. I will not be surprised if this one only lasts 2-3 years but for $80 with a lifetime warranty, you cannot complain. If the swap was a 3hr+ job I would be going a different route but the swap took me at most 30 minutes......

 

Actually you can complain. When it burst into flames and your van catches fire, I'm pretty sure thats not covered by the warranty.

Look, even if the parts stores don't list them as compatible, you can get 3g alternators there too, they only cost a little more than the lame 2g you bought, they don't catch fire, they keep your battery fully charged, even when idling with full electrical load. All you have to do is find one that has the same mounting bracket, then go to town. Takes the same amount of time to install, and maybe costs $10 more.

Jose, why are you going on this buy American rant? No one else ever said to buy American parts, you did. No one here even said to buy a dealer one, which isn't necessarily made in USA anyway.

Some archeologists say a lot of things without any proof, or even evidence really. The only native peoples that are of Asian origin (by genetic testing and feature comparison) are the Inuit and they are referred to by the other native tribes as outsiders. In fact, by testing genetic markets, according to a wide spectrum study, in conflict with the prevailing popular Asian migration theory, most native american people originated from European migrants around 10,000 years ago. Don't ask how they got there, that has many archeologists baffled too, but the DNA testing is conclusive, more than 2/3rds of the native peoples in the Americas that were tested test positive for origin from these European groups. The remaining third test positive for origin from more recent European migrations, Asian migrations, and in some cases, African migrations. By recent I mean within the last 5,000 years.

 

I'm dumping this forum if this racial/ethnic stuff is allowed to keep going.
all a bunch of opinions that only hurt.

cut this off NOW PLEASE copper.

way off original topic and against forum rules

adios until this major problem is taken care of.