89 bronco EB 351 fuel injected stock

recent things I worked on and things that have happen.
1. I drove through deep water. broke down with a wet fuel pump relay. fixed it.
2. had to change all my front bearings, roters turned, and new pads. works great.
3. worked on my steero system changed out a new speaker. Works great.

Today driving to work I noticed that my alternator gauge was siting on 12 volts when it is usualy above the half way mark. what the hell I thought. It is a brand new alternator less than a year old.

So I went home cleaned the cables and still no fix. While the engine is running and I pull the negetive cable, the engine dies.

So I took it to the Oreillys and they tested it and said the internal regulator was not working. So I got a brand new alt because I had life time warrenty on the other.

I installed it. Started my truck and still the battery light is on and the gauge is still on 12 volts and getting lower cuz the battery is getting lower.

I checked all connections and everything looks right. Old but right.

What could it be? What should I check next? Could I just have another bad alternator? Is their a fuse some where?

The engine runs great, starts great, just no charge.

Please help, for I am truckless and have to have my wife drop me off in the morning for work

Thanks Paul

 

If you ran long enough with the alternator not charging the battery, you could have damaged the battery. Not drained it but just taxed it hard enough to kill a cell or two inside. When that happens no amount of charging will save it because the dead cell will suck down everything being fed into the battery and leave nothing for the other cells to play with.

 

Thanks for the reply. Question! if my battery is damaged...could it make the alt not work as well? If the engine is running...then I remove the negitive cable...shoudn't the alt keep the truck running if it is working?

All the time before this happen, I could rev up my engine and see that the alt was suppling more charge by looking at the instrument pannel. Now it just sits on 12-13 volts as if it is reading the battery and the alt is not supplying any power.

Thanks for any help.

 

Ok I read this on AutoZone . com.

"The battery is connected to the alternator at all times, whether the ignition key is turned on or not. If the battery were shorted to ground, the alternator would also be shorted. This would damage the alternator. To prevent this, a fuse link is installed in the wiring between the battery and the alternator. If the battery is shorted, the fuse link is melted, protecting the alternator. "

So I believe (if this is true) that my fuse link is melted. Where would I find this?

Thanks Paul

 

Ok I'm not getting much help here. But I will try one more time.
I went to Oreillys and got my battery charged and checked. Its good. I had the Alt checked it says its bad on the truck, but when we remove it and check it it is good. So I replaced all the wireing to the Alt with new plugs and wires as far back as the plugs wire came with. Now as long as I keep my RPMs above 2000 my battery light will turn off. but the volt meter on the dash is still reading 13 volts. The alt check machine still says my alt is not charging, but it is testing it through the whole charging system. So what this tells me (but maybe not you) is that it is not sending a charge to the battery, so what would make it do that?

Please help.

 

Not sure what it could be...did you get any info from the parts store that tested the alt while it was still connected? Bad ground maybe...

 

The people at Oriellys thinks it has something to do with my wiring, that is why I have replaced all the plugs to the alt. I think it has some thing to do with a fues or relay, but I don't know where to look.

 

Check the fusible links that connect the alternator wiring to the battery. Your 89 has a few of them up at the start solenoid on the inner fender. If the fusible link was blown when the old alternator died, the problem is right there. The electricity is not getting back to the battery because the fusible link is blown. The fusible link for the alternator feeds the BLACK/ORANGE and YELLOW/WHITE wires running to the alternator. Replace the fusible link and see what happens.

 

Greystreak you did it again. You last reply lead me straight to the problem. I fix and found the problem with in ten min. First I removed the battery, then I pulled the plugs off the alt. I traced the wires from the alt back to the starter solonoide, right their it was. the orange wire completely gone under the wire rubber at the conection to the solonoide. Don't know where it went, it's like it broke from the oem plug and just moved backwards. Any way I cut it and put a new connection on and everything works great. Thanks for your help.

 

hehehe buy that guy a beer! i cant stand electrical problems

 

electrical problems are usually the hardest to trouble shoot, glad you got her running!

 

Bring 'em on. Electrical "gremlins" are my personal forte. Glad to hear you got her up and running again.