89 LXI Accord - battery light issue

[vrackley]

Been on & off intermittant since last Friday 12/08/06..
It sat idle for awhile on Saturday with the battery light on and I checked under the hood and altenator belt seemed to be turning everything fine...
I have changed out the battery and battery cables and still light comes on.
The thing that's got me stumped is when I up the rpm's, current to 4k or more, the light goes out... but if it settles down below 4k the light comes back on.
Does anyone know why it would do that? I replaced the battery because the one I had in it up til last week was just plain old and yuck.. now I got me a bad-A new one, but I certainly don't want to drain that sucker. Could this be a bad alternator? Or maybe connection I don't know about. With the car off I inspected the belt and it seems fine. Any responses appreciated!

oh..fuel injected btw...

[MessyHonda]

take your car to a auto parts store...then can test out if you have a bad alternator or a bad batt..but it sounds like a bad alternator.

[shepherd79]

your alternator is dead i can tell you that right now.
get a new alternator.

[vrackley]

I figured maybe the alternator... was hoping for some wiring/connection I didn't know to check. Never had one just half-die on me before... thanks

[MessyHonda]

I figured maybe the alternator... was hoping for some wiring/connection I didn't know to check. Never had one just half-die on me before... thanks

well at least you can get a high output one now. unless you are all stock.

[A18A]

i think you should just need to replace the brushes, if the light goes out above 4k that (from what i think) it means that (shit i can't explain this) the brushes are very worn and the alt is spinning too slow for the brushes to do their thing. but when the alt is spinning soo fast that when you go above 4k its creating minimum charge for the battery.

ugh i cant explain, hope you know what i mean

thats just my theory anyway

[shepherd79]

the higher RPM the higher alternator output.
You can try brushes, they are dirt cheap, but if you go that far you may as well change the whole thing.

[Blkblurr]

could be the voltage regulator gong bad.

[vrackley]

do you guys know if autozone sells the parts to rebuild an alternator? like the brushes & regulator & such??? thanks again

[3rdgeneration]

whats is the voltage regulator? because i have a brand new battery and alternator and im have the same problem with the light comming on and off depending on rpm?

[88Accord-DX]

I personally use a digital mulitmeter to see what kind of voltage the alternator is putting out to determine if the brushes are gone. The voltage regulator is inside the alternator. If that is bad, you might as well get a rebuilt alternator. Pretty sure Napa or good parts store could or can get brushes. Their is how-to up there in electrical.

Doubt the voltage regulator is sold as a unit by itself. Haven't looked into it.

[carotman]

Same thing happened to me like 4 years ago. It was the brushes, they're worth $10 or so.