240 amps? No, your stock cables would heat up really quick if you start drawing much more amperage than your stock alternator was designed to put out, which should be 110 amps. Also, keep in mind those stock cables (B+ and battery cables + and -) are pretty old and worn down by now.

 

OP you need to read up on the 6.0 forum about alternators and 6.0 charging issues. User Toomanytoys is a great resource and has posted very credible info about the pitfalls of the 6.0 charging system.
Just for basics you need to upgrade like I have to an additional and larger charging wire from the alt to the pass battery that is fused. And you should also add a new additional ground front the block to the drivers side frame rail where the drivers battery is grounded now. This will help put to use the additional amperage your new high rated alt will put out. You can also upgrade the interconnect cable. Clean all your grounds also. Read up.

 

Yes amps, my mistake. I am surprised that is the recommended alternator on their website (for 6.0 Exs) without any footnote about larger cables.
But like you say if original they are getting old and it's a good opportunity to change out.

 

Going to larger cables are really not a big deal. Mod is referred to as the "big three upgrade"... most on here that have gone to bigger alternators have done the mod.

 

Ed @ Ficmrepair.com (site sponsor - hint hint) sells a complete kit. The battery terminals are even indexed correctly so they line up with the mounting bolts.

It is super easy to install, plus this kit includes a high-amp fuse to prevent welding things together in the event two things that shouldn't touch each other do.

 

Is the kit the same for the 7.3?

 

No it is not, but it would work. I have installed one of his kits on a 6.0, and I have upgraded my own 7.3 with my own "kit".

 

Rather than changing existing known good wires, one can instead install an additional wire to distribute the current, which not only reduces the heat/load on the existing wire, it provides redundancy should the existing wire develop internal resistance due to unseen corrosion that wicked its way through the strands under the insulation.

Here are some photos of what additional positive and negative cables can look like in a 7.3L application, that I installed when upgrading to the 230A Leece Neville alternator:



Above: Dual parallel battery to battery positive cables traversing the radiator.



Making the cable: I added dual layer adhesive lined heat shrink over the fully enclosed lug barrel to jacket intersection, along with a spiral wound abrasion protector (red) over the black high temperature insulation jacket. In the photo above, I am starting with an OEM quality wire that has high heat rated insulation that will not burn, melt, soften, or harden as easily as the multi-aught PVC jacketed so called "marine" battery cables typically sold online as "big three upgrades". The black 1 gauge cable from Standard is factory built with fully enclosed pre-tinned lugs machine crimped with zero clearance between jacket and lug for the least possible opportunity for water penetration that could eventually lead to corrosion.

I didn't have time to order online, so I sourced materials locally, and made modifications as needed. A lot of guys go crazy with the 0000 gauge cable, but there is a limit as to how thick a cable can be before it can no longer pass through or fit between other components along its routing without risk of abrasion. 2 gauge has more than enough ampacity to carry the current required for the short runs between battery to alternator or battery to starter, especially when adding a cable in parallel with the existing OEM cable. However, I used the even thicker 1 gauge, striking a balance between improving ampacity, without going overboard on the copper.

More important than the sheer amount of copper is the protection of the cable, because problems with battery cables invariably are due to shorts from vibration resulting in abrasion, or insulation burn through from contact with high heat components like exhaust manifolds, and most often, from corrosion from seepage under the jacket. These are all failures of the wire jacketing, not the wire itself. So it seems worth while to make space allowances for the wire insulation jacketing and sealing, when considering the overall thickness of the cable.





I encased the heat shrunk, spiral wound cable assembly inside split convoluted wire loom (with green or blue stripe, which indicates higher heat rating of the loom), and tape wrapped it in Scotch 35 Red. The result is still a big, thick battery cable, but a great deal of the thickness is devoted to mitigating measures that guard against how battery cables actually fail, which typically isn't due to a lack of copper.



Heat, abrasion, and corrosion are what typically weakens battery cables. Here, a partial length of high heat aluminum skinned fiberglass wrap is pre-installed where the alternator ground cable will route in very close proximity to the exhaust manifold.



(Lower alternator shown above) I paid a LOT of attention to alternator grounding, and alternative grounding paths, due to electrical noise effecting hall effect sensors like the output speed shaft sensor in the transmission. I found that grounding issues were the sole cause, and the effect, of some 4R100 transmission shifting issues I experienced immediately following a change in alternators. So now, my alternators ground directly to the block, frame, and the batteries directly. (But NOT to, or through. the body).



(Upper alternator shown above). The positive cables to the upper alternator were "upgraded" with redundancy, rather than replacement. In addition to the factory B+ cable, a new (red) positive cable was routed from the new high amp alternator directly to each battery, with each new cable independently fused at the alternator.



Another view, from behind the upper alternator.



Annotated view, with descriptions of most of the connections to the new Leece Neville 230A alternator, highlighting the redundancy.



Upper alternator also has triple redundant grounding, to the block by mounting through the aluminum casting front cover, directly to the iron short block by cable to the case, and directly to the batteries by cable. None of the cables are huge 0000, but all of the 1 guage cables taken together provide current carrying capacity way far in excess of what is needed, with fault tolerance. Any two paths can fail, while functionality remains uninterrupted.



Speaking of failure... a return visit to the measures taken to avoid failure, including insistence of finding striped split convoluted loom that has properties to prevent fire propagation throughout the engine bay.



More details on the benefits of OEM quality factory crimped cabling, vs the huge copper glitzy garbage typically found at the high end stereo store, where insufficient attention is paid to the mechanical details of the cable to lug junction.



Details on the dual layer adhesive lined heat shrink over the lug to jacket connection, as well as the material and temp rating of the wire cabling jacket.



Upper alternator and driver's side battery to engine block grounds, at their attachment to the block, for the 7.3L engine.



OEM negative ground cables, with call outs for the enumerated ground locations as defined in the wiring diagrams for the 1999-2001 7.3L engine.



Back to the positives... driver's side battery positive cable call out list for spider of cables that increase the current carrying capacity of the truck wiring to accommodate the new higher amp Leece Neville (aka L-N) alternator.

 

Thanks for the awesome write up!

 

The GENUINE Leece Neville that most of us who have them are running is NOT 350 amps. It is 230 amps. There are a lot of knock off look alike black case alternators that are falsely advertised as so called "Leece Neville", but they are NOT the genuine Leece Neville manufactured by Prestolite at the original old Leece Neville factory in New York state.

Ironically, Prestolite, formerly a US company, is now a Chinese owned and headquartered company, and has been for a number of years now. Prestolite also acquired Leece Neville, essentially making it a Chinese company as well, although as of last year, the final manufacture of the particular model of Leece Neville alternator that we are referring to for this application remains in the USA, at the New York plant, using both USA and foreign source components.

So it isn't possible to say at this point to avoid Chinese made knock off garbage look alikes masquerading as the real deal, because even the real deal is now Chinese owned... just like Milwaukee tools, DeWalt tools, Porter Cable tools... all once formidable American brand names in rotating electric motors, that now are not only 100% manufactured in China, but are also 100% owned by Chinese conglomerates.

However, at least with this one particular model of Leece Neville alternator, a handful of hardworking blue collar workers have retained their jobs in the New York plant. That doesn't necessarily mean those workers are US citizens, but presumably they are here legally, and the income they earn recirculates, at least partially, in our domestic economy.

The fake alternator that is advertised as a 350 amp Leece Neville is sold by "Nations" Alternator and Starter, as well as various sellers on eBay. On the other hand, there are at least two FTE sponsor venders who sell the genuine USA made Prestolite Leece Neville 230 amp alternator that is the same part that Ford Motor Company sells as a genuine blue label service part for the Low Cab Forward medium duty chassis cab where this alternator was original equipment. THAT is the Leece Neville we are referring to around here.