3G upgrade problem?
Thread Starter
|
Senior User
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 175
Likes: 0
From: Eastern Washington
3G upgrade problem?
Good morning FTE, So, yesterday afternoon I bragged about paying 9 bucks on a 3G at the JY. It was clean and didn't have the typical white blotchy crap growing on the body you see so often so I thought it was ok. I did the install as described in the tech tips. I've got a mega fuse in line between the hot side of the starter solenoid and the alternator, yellow wire piggy backed on the lug at the back of the 3G and the green/red stripe to factory green/red stripe. The install went awesome as far as fitment, cleanliness I liked everything about it. I Went to start it up and no power in the cab whatsoever. I checked voltage at all connections and have a good 12.6 everywhere. I suspect my 9 dollar JY alternator at this point. I have not had it bench tested, am I missing anything?
Thanks guys
Thanks guys
Thread Starter
|
Senior User
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 175
Likes: 0
From: Eastern Washington
Sorry for the late reply. You hit the nail on the head (again) ri_truck_guy. The VR was fried. I exchanged units and that's all she wrote. 14.8 at the battery at idle and the needle on the gauge isn't constantly at 2 o'clock anymore, not too shabby. Do you remember the thread I posted a few weeks ago after I had installed an 800W sound system and was complaining about some serious RF noise? ri_truck_guy you suggested I may be overloading the stock alternator and that's really what got me serious about this 3G set up. Anyway, the irritating alternator whine is totally gone and I'm not as pissed off about having to R&R the bad alternator anymore.
Postmaster
Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 4,802
Likes: 1
KJ, just a heads-up, but losing power in the cab is usually not related to the alternator at all - you may wanna inspect all your connections at the starter solenoid, just in case.
Also, with that big sound system, where do you draw power for it, straight from the battery? If so you may wanna move the alternator charging cable to the battery as well, it's not an issue if your alternator cable is the same size or smaller than the one that runs between the battery and the starter relay on the fender, but when you have a 1/0 alternator cable and a 6awg starter relay cable the latter becomes a bottleneck in your system and kills all good that comes from the big cable. I have well over 1kW of lights on my truck, plus there are the juice-monger glowplugs, all drawing power directly from the batteries, and so my alternator is charging the batteries directly through a 1/0 cable - this way my 4awg starter relay cable (which is actually larger than the factory setup) don't bottleneck my electrical system at all.
Also, with that big sound system, where do you draw power for it, straight from the battery? If so you may wanna move the alternator charging cable to the battery as well, it's not an issue if your alternator cable is the same size or smaller than the one that runs between the battery and the starter relay on the fender, but when you have a 1/0 alternator cable and a 6awg starter relay cable the latter becomes a bottleneck in your system and kills all good that comes from the big cable. I have well over 1kW of lights on my truck, plus there are the juice-monger glowplugs, all drawing power directly from the batteries, and so my alternator is charging the batteries directly through a 1/0 cable - this way my 4awg starter relay cable (which is actually larger than the factory setup) don't bottleneck my electrical system at all.
Thread Starter
|
Senior User
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 175
Likes: 0
From: Eastern Washington
Wow, interesting....maybe the bad voltage regulator was a coincidence. At any rate after installing the exchange unit everything worked. I checked voltage where I knew it should be when I was having issues and everything checked out. Makes me wonder a bit what happened now but it works and I'm pleased to this point. I took enough of the harness from the donor car to have the same gauge wire on both sides of the mega fuse. I do like the idea of going directly to the battery though. The lug on the soleniod looks pretty full, I have 2 60 amp breakers at the battery powering the sound system and a short, big and fat single ground source for the amps. I understand what you're saying about the bottleneck and how it would defeat the good stuff up to it. I wasn't thinking on those lines at the time, I figured I had better the same guage wire on either side of the mega fuse because it seemed the right thing to do. Thanks for posting your experience and knowledge, I think it's awesome.
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
zoom38
1987 - 1996 F150 & Larger F-Series Trucks
39
Mar 30, 2018 01:53 PM
highoctane74
1973 - 1979 F-100 & Larger F-Series Trucks
10
Oct 14, 2013 12:44 PM
