all electrical cutting out.

[lostforawhile]

Ok I can probably figure this one out on my own, but any input is appreciated. the electrical system in my accord is on the fritz, it will randomly lose all power,even the lights,while the engine is running. the battery is pretty new,the alternator is pretty new, I already replaced the battery clamps and the wires look good. I would think key switch,but the power for the lights isn't routed through it. it's also pretty new because the start contacts burned out in it. also when this is happening the radio resets and the volt meter flucuates all over the place. whats strange is everything goes out,even with the alternator operating. any ideas? anything to narrow it down will save me a lot of searching. I'm wondering about the alternator also,I've replaced this alternator twicew under warranty. it's a nappa. and the battery was replaced at the same time, as the old alternator damaged it. I'm also getting the high rpm alternator light and the alternator doesn't like to kick in sometimes until high rpms. right now it's sitting with the battery quick disconnect pulled. I want to make sure I don't have a fire start somewhere.

[Vanilla Sky]

sounds like you got another bad alt.

outside of that, check your fuses. the contacts on the big main fuses could be a little dirty.

[shepherd79]

yeah i have to agree with vanilla, you have a bad alternator.
I never liked napa. They always want to overcharge for parts.


PS. are you still interested in my parts?

[2oodoor]

dont forget to check the ground side of the situtation, also the back side of the relay panel under the hood
Just a note, I kept getting short lived parts from both napa and carquest, so I said bump and may as well get them from advance or o reillys, and local electrical gurus.

[nswst8]

The ignition switch, is what was causing my electrical mystery, its not the key switch its the ignition switch that has contacts that wear away with time. Its about a 12" wire harness section. It ran me $51 and change back in 94 and 15 minutes to install.

[lostforawhile]

it's not the key switch,the light wiring doesn't go through it. it's also pretty new. everything is cutting out for a second or two at a time. all my grounds are new and so is my positive cable. I'm thinking the regulator in the alternator is bad,the voltmeter goes nuts both dropping out and pegging at the top end of the scale. it's possible it's also taken out the battery again,or the battery went bad and caused the alternator to charge until it died. I had the batttery before this one take out the previous alternator. I always try to replace both at the same time. lucky the battery is under warranty.

[2oodoor]

yea those voltage readings sound like battery shorting out. or positive wire grounding out somewhere.

[POS carb]

if the headlights cut out too I would suspect the battery terminals or the 70 amp fuse under the hood
you're right about the ignition switch, the lights aren't affected by it

[Blkblurr]

Several things I see here. If the radio is loosing power then the battery is not connected anymore. This would not be caused by a bad alt. If the battery shorted out you would have smoke and fire and melted wires. Sounds to me like a bad connection in the positive cable, a ground wire or a bad connection on the fuse box.

[lostforawhile]

well I put my ohm meter in the circuit and drove it with the meter on peak hold,the voltage is spiking at 18 v and dropping to zero. I also have some indication of ac volts, my guess is the alternator diodes or one of them has shorted out. the radio isn't going completly off I think it's switching to protection mode. clarions have pretty good input voltage protection. eithier the regulator is gone,one of the diodes are gone, or the diode has gone bad and taken out the regulator. another thing I'm going to check is the connnector for the field current wire and the warning light wire,if it's intermittent,the battery may be weak and the alternator may be switching on and off. this may account for the wierd voltage spikes. one of my future projects is to install a backup alternator where the ac compressor is now. when you have one thats just spinning and the field curent is switched off it doesn't have much parasitic drag. it's when you turn on the field current and engerize the stator, that it draws a load on the engine.

[lostforawhile]

well an update, the battery checks out fine. tomorrow i'm going to get busy and pull the alternator. the alternator cable to the underhood fuse box is fine,so is the battery cable and the ground cables. I might pull the underhood fuse box and check all the heavy connections inside of it anyway, I'll figure it out. will keep updated as progress is made.