Thread: Just purchased another P10 and am having some electrical/charing issue! Need advice!

So I picked up another P10 friday(1993). The previous owner said it needed a battery...no problem. We got another battery after doing the title transfer and put it in. The first problem we ran across was the negative battery cable. The eyelet that comes off the main wire about 12" from the terminal connector that bolts to the chassis was too short with the new orientation of the battery. Left it unhooked thinking it wasn't a HUGE deal. Went to fire it up and it turned over really slow...put the headlights on and they were blinking another with the dash lights and the tach was going all over the place. Went to reconnect it but with it being near midnight we improvised and used a small piece of 8 gauge wire used for amps and car audio to give us the length we needed to connect it back to the chassis. Fired it back up and everything seemed fine. Put the voltmeter to it and was at 14ish volts. I went home for the night, went to work the next morning and drove around Sunday no problem. Come monday morning I went to warm it up before work and bam, blinking lights and wacky tach. WTF? Made it to work okay, went out at around 1pm to see what was going on and wa-la! No blinking lights or wacky tach everything is normal. Drove to numerous places after work and all was well. This morning same thing! This time it stalled at my buddy's house as I was picking him up for work. Wouldn't restart...barely turned over. I had him try cranking it while I messed with the negative cable and it still wouldn't start and battery acid ended up bubbling out the top...ouch. Left it in the street at his house and took the bus. At lunch time I came back and brought a booster pack with me to start it...didn't even pop the hood..got in and it started fine. Lights were blinking but I gave it a rev and all was normal. So after work I took off the stupid speaker wire(8ga)...rearranged the CAI piping and filter, sanded down the spot where that eyelet connects to the chassis and just used the eyelet to connect to the chassis. I am hoping that this was the problem but am definitely not convinced...we will see tomorrow morning I guess...in the mean time any thoughts or suggestions? Could my alternator be bad?


Thanks!

Joe

shitty negative cable and ghetto rigging of the ground that might be the problem

Yeah I fixed the stupidity like I said so hoping that was it. Next I will pick up another negative cable.

Ground is ground, you either have it or you don't. If you don't have it nothing will happen. Put a proper negative cable on it just to rule that out, then start looking on the positive (+) side. First check connections on the alt, make sure the + isn't loose/touching the body of the alt.

And please unhook your battery before you start poking around down there.

Any particular reason it would be acting up in the morning (it has been close to zero degrees) opposed to midday when it's warmer? That's what I don't understand. After I swap the negative cable I will check the juice wire...I did verify the alternator connections are secure though. Previous owner says he never had this problem and I am inclined to trust him. Could my new battery be faulty?

New batteries are thoroughly checked before leaving factory, not likely to be bad. Take it to autozone and scan it. They'll check both battery and alternator for you. I just posted the same response to another thread. gluck

edit: your symptoms appear to be bad voltage regulator which is inside alternator. may need to rebuild it, it'll be cheaper in the long run to rebuild rather than get one from Autozone, you'll end up doing it every year otherwise.

a ground is not a ground. you need a GOOD ground. id replace the whole cable and make sure it is bolted to the frame and finally at the motor.

Absolutely the ground has to be a good one, I take that for granite, but a bad or weak ground wouldn't cause the issues being described.

I like to make a multiground, so you have some redundancy

Gotta make that rust work hard

Okay so this morning I fired it up..let her warm up then left for work. Revved it up to take off and had a couple flashes for maybe 2 seconds and as I hit about 2500 rpm it stopped and I had full juice with no issues at all on the way in. Started it after work and the lights were a tad dim but no flashing...blipped the throttle and it brightened up with no issues after. This is with the original ground to the chassis and where it bolts to is sanded down to make sure for a solid connection....thoughts?