APOC received his check yesterday, thanks for the refund David.

 

190HD's headed out to FICMrepair.com just in time for the holidays.....
Get them while they last.


ALSO... LivingLarge as soon as our billet XP frame is done ill have you a blue one for your truck.... Ill keep in touch. Happy Holidays!!!!!!

 

Woo hoo! Nothing like opening something so awesome in time for Christmas!

We can't wait to get those bad boys in here. The last pallet sure didn't last long...

 

I do appreciate your efforts in saving a client.

 

After discussion with Dave at DC Eng'g and advice receiver here I had her towed. After the elec tech heard my case, the second thing he did was put the DC Alt on the test stand. After 30 seconds of adjustments he said, "man this thing is kicking out 14.5-.6 volts." He then proceeds telling me what a "high end" alternator I had.
The first thing he told me was the battery light did not work. He took the dash completely out looking for a bad wire which he did not find but he did fix the battery light. He replaced the sensor/light plug to the alternator and found a wire on the stbd fender adjacent to the battery that had been chewed by a rat.
I knew about the rat chew but it appeared to be a dead end plug.
Bottom line; DC Eng'g made me a high end alternator that is worth every cent.
Wire chewing rats suck.
P.S. The tech did have to grind a spot on the alt fdn just fwd of the aft mount bolt to clear a bolt head that held a strap for the heater hose.

 

Reviving an old thread...

Anyone else have any issues with DC Power alternators? Mine died just before the 2 year warranty period, and I have been having a hard time dealing with the company over the warranty.

 

Did you try ficmrepair?

 

Yeah, Ed is great. I bought it from him originally. The response I have received from DC Power on the other hand.....not what I would even call acceptable customer service.

After doing more searching it seems that the only way DC Power responds to complaints is public shaming. I won't go into detail here, but it is just sad that my $400 alternator died just barely within the warranty period, when the stock one lasted for 180k miles.

 

Haven't seen this thread in some time....
Some things never change.

 

I don't know where you live but they are in Riverside ca. I had a complait and the owner was there and fixed it his self. I'm in Norco Ca.

 

This just happened to me - Just under the 2yr mark... What irks me to no end is I have only put 12K miles on the truck since I have changed all this out with a new cable kit and AGM batteries

I have taken a few short trips, drive it to work once or twice a week and golf on the weekends.

I still have the original "undersized" alternator that continued to work before I removed it...

 

Mine failed with in a year, so i have a replacement on the shelf I couldn't wait for the replacement so installed a 250 amp mechman thats been working fine for a few years

 

When reporting any failure of a DC Power Engineering, Inc. alternator... please also report the FULL MODEL NUMBER & SERIES of said failure, not just the amperage rating. It really does make a difference.

For a 6.0L, the current models are:

185 Amp OEM Series

190 Amp HD Series
250 Amp HD Series

250 Amp XP Series
270 Amp XP Series
370 Amp XP Series


The foregoing list is grouped by the internal alternator technology... ie, S-wound stators vs segmented conductor (aka flat wire or "hair pin") stators, etc.

The power of sharing information on the forums will be much for useful to the FTE community if we can distinguish which specific alternators are not fairing as well in long term service, rather than throwing the baby out with the bath water and condemning an entire brand based on a bad batch of fruit in the line.

The "Valeo" rectifier, described by Dave at DC Power as "defective" a couple of years ago in this thread, serves as a perfect example of the importance if differentiating specific model numbers, such as the "SPX Series" when reporting failures. If we just read that DC Power sucks, then that might dissuade others from trying say, the XP series alternator, which employs Denso parts that still lead the industry as far as power generating density within a given form factor.

Furthermore, there might be differences within an alternator of the same series. Since it has been established that diodes are often the Achilles heel of most alternators, knowing the model of alternator that failed might help us figure out which diodes were used in said alternator.

For example, some alternators come with 50 amp diodes, some have 70 amp diodes. And besides amperage ratings, there are also Avalanche diodes, that are of higher quality at the same amperage rating. So I think it helps to be specific with the model number, even when we don't know what diodes were used in the given model number... because at least we will have the part number to ask and find out.

 

You read the entire thread.... and the part about there warranty service/claims handling abilities.

Ed at FICMrepair.com is the reason they are able to continue sales on this forum for 6.0 engines... PERIOD. THERE ARE those that will disagree, but they're after the sale service speaks for itself, no matter how good a product is!

 

Randy, I did read this entire thread, and other threads on alternators where DC Power is mentioned as well, and in those threads, your position on DC Power's poor after sale service based on your battery cable purchase is just as resolutely clear as in this thread. You're not only frustrated on behalf of all the poor experiences you've read about, you are also speaking from your personal experience. I get it.

And, I wouldn't limit DC Power's customer service issues to just after the sale. I tried and tried and tried again to reach DC Power by calling the number on their website, BEFORE the sale, all to no avail. No answer. And I was prepared to eventually purchase five XP alternators from them, but if I couldn't get ahold of anyone BEFORE the sale, that didn't leave me much hope of reaching anyone after the sale should I have a problem.

However, that was just my personal experience. It may not be everyone's, so let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. DC Power already paid the price for their short comings in customer service in my case, in the form of what might have been $2,800 in lost sales, if I eventually converted my entire mini fleet to their products. Instead, I bought a different brand alternator, from a manufacturer that answered the phone, and returned my calls when I left messages.

That all being said, I don't think that DC Power should continue to pay the price if DC becomes, or in fact is now, more responsive to other folks inquiries.

Regardless, it remains important for us to know the technical differences of failed alternators, because, by the owner, president, and CEO's own admission... DC Power does not design or manufacture the electrical components to these alternators. Rather, DC Power orders off the shelf components from the alternator OEMS (such as Denso, Delco, Valeo, etc) and merely assembles and presumably tests them. The distinguishing difference that is unique to DC Power is their billet drive end frames and opportunity to order them in various colors (neither of which most technical minded folks care about or for).

DC Power might argue that they stand apart from other builders in that they select only "the best" electrical components available, and only from OEM manufactures, not rebuilder suppliers like WAI. However, DC Power is not the only alternator builder who is capable of ordering parts from Denso and the like. Denso is obviously a world wide company, and Denso is even producing their own line of segmented conductor alternators to service the aftermarket heavy trucking industry. I've talked to the application engineers at Denso. You can too. DC Power isn't the only player in the game.

But DC certainly is a well known player, especially in the communication circles of enthusiast forums. Therefore, it is more likely that we will read about a Denso hairpin alternator assembled by DC Power, then we will about one assembled by say, Romaine Electric, which actually makes a lot of the hair pin alternators that other retail sellers sell and pass off as their own.

Therefore, it is more likely that we can learn about the real world longevity of a given alternator technology (such as segmented conductor) from a DC Power unit failure, than we will from a cloaked brand. So I maintain that despite anyone's feelings about DC Power, it is still very instructive to post the full model number and series of any problems with a DC Power alternator, so we can apply that experience in comparing the merits of any given alternator technology, not just the engravings or the color of the case. For this comparison, the customer service reputation of DC Power doesn't really matter. We can get the same technology from other sources.

But we are less likely to get the long term feedback that is so instructive, unless the brand was popular and had enough market penetration to provide a good sample size. Hence, I still think it is valuable to be more specific when reporting.