Hey all, hoping someone can point me in the right direction. Three months ago, I got a new battery in my 2000 Mazda Protege ES. This past weekend, I had an issue and had to get a new (remanufactured ) alternator. Drive it back 150 miles (I was out of town at the time) and things are fine...until last night.

Battery light comes on, then shortly after goes off...ok, fine. I'll deal with this in the morning. Today, I have a very similar point that I did with the battery and with the alternator: Driving along, suddenly the radio goes out, shortly followed by the whole car losing electric. Roll it to a stop in a parking lot and curse a few dozen times.

After a brief wait (spent making many phone calls), I was able to get it started again, and back on the road, to a much better parking spot.

But where do I go from here? What could be bad? Could the alternator be bad from the get go? What else could I be looking at?

Thank you in advance for any help!

 

Things to check.
1. Check the alternator drive belt condition and belt tension are OK.
2. Make sure your battery post connectors are clean and in good shape.
3. Disconnect your battery negative, then loosen the main chassis ground plate just near your wiper motor, clean the 3 bolts and the plate itself well and tighten it back down; then do the same with the engine block main ground connection located on the passenger side engine mount.
4. Replace the battery negative terminal, check you have at least 12 volts across the battery (when the battery voltage is below about 11.5, the car will start but the excitation is too low and the alternator won't charge); if not, have it charged or use booster cables to get your car started.
5. With the engine at a fast idle, check that you have no less than 13 volts and no more than 15 volts across the battery terminals.
6. If OK, test drive the car to recharge the battery.
&.Get back here and let us know your findings.

 

Hey there, tried some more before I saw oldeng's response.

Tried jumping it last night and I got nothing, even with the cables hooked up. Still able to get a little be of power response, lights coming on and dashboard a little dim.

 

OK, Do as much as you can of the checklist I posted; they are very important.
Look for the engine compartment fusebox, it's between the engine coolant reservoir and battery. Remove the cover, and on the underside you'll see a schematic of the fuse, rating, function, location and the relay layout. One of the fuses, the 100Amp. (blue) one nearest the engine is not a plug-in, but is held on by two nuts.
Check it for continuity. If it's blown, your old alternator may have done it in.
[ It would help a lot if you described in some detail the "issue" you had with the alternator you replaced recently.]
Check the continuity (with a meter, not just visually) of all the fuses in that fusebox and get back on this forum with your findings.

 

if you can get ahold of a multumeter reader tell me what your amps and volts are a normal running car has 14.7 volts running 12 volts off and amps about 120 amps running but it will only show about 90 amps because alternators only run at 80% capacity if you are running low on amps or volts its the alternator check the harness going into the alternator to see its condition if that harness is messed up that is your problem if not it had to be the alternator

 

Sorry, I forgot to check back in on this. I decided to just take it in and get the car looked at, I had gone to a national chain and had a warranty. Sure enough it was the alternator that was bad, this one has survived this, granted the last one made it all of 200 miles before going down, so who knows.

Thank you for taking a look and giving some responses!

 

Be careful: it's worth doing a good inspection/ cleanup of the main chassis ground plate that your battery negative cable is connected to, and the main engine ground on the passenger side engine mount. If either of those aren't well bonded, the alternator will be underloaded, and even with an intermittent ground, the no load alternator voltage will jump high enough to damage it.

 

I know this is an old thread, but in the interest of keeping the thread alive (and not asking the same question again elsewhere) I'm adding on to it.

I'm having a similar issue with a 94 Protégé. Battery light came on, had the car tested at a local auto parts place, they determined it needed an alternator (0 volts showing at the battery).

Bought the new alternator, installed it (forgot to have them bench test it) and I'm getting the same symptoms -- battery light on, alternator NOT charging the battery. Car will jump and start fine, but obviously won't run very long on battery alone.

Took the car back to the auto parts place, and the alternator shows same as before - 0 volts at the battery. They've order a replacement, but dude at the parts place said to check continuity of the ground on the alternator to the battery.

I'll try oldeng's checklist above tomorrow before I pull the alternator and report back here.

 

The positive wire could be fried from the alternator to the battery.
Check your main body ground for the car and clean the rust off it.
I also like to add another ground wire from the engine block to the negative terminal of the battery, possibly adding another body ground as well. Those are the easiest things first. After that it gets more difficult: fuse box, bad wire harness connection, bad ECU.
Good luck.

 

My car is sitting in my garage after being told by mechanic they couldn’t work on it because they didn’t know what was wrong with it.

I have a 2001 Mazda 626 with 123k miles on it. I have not driven it since November of last year. I want to figure out what’s wrong with it. Where do I even start? I’m am willing to learn so I can figure this out. Jack of all trades but have not ventured into cars much at all.

many help is appreciated.