Well, on the way home from this year's Fall Gathering, my 25 decided to stop charging. I barely made it home on battery power alone fortunately.
So, I dove into the problem by purchasing a new mid 50's Chevrolet voltage regulator specifically for Chevy trucks with generators, a digital multi-meter, and our trusty wiring diagram. Yesterday, I finally got to sit down and try to hook it up. It is marked differently than the Toyota regulator, so I had to dig into the wiring diagram to figure out what wire goes where. There are basically 4 terminals with 5 wires. Ground (to the generator casing), (BATT) Battery, idiot light (comes off the Armature), (A) Armature, and (F) Field. The generator is marked with the A and F if you scrape the residue off of the casing.
So, I have everything hooked up as I think it should be. But my idiot light is still on. I am pretty sure that it is charging though. I put a meter across the battery while the truck is running and get 12.15 volts. When I turn the lights on, the reading drops to 11.75 volts and stays there. If I turn the lights on, it climbs back to 12.15V again. I am not sure on how to check the output of the generator though. I metered it a few different ways and the only way I get voltage looks like itsputting out 3V or so regardless of the engine RPM.
Fortunately, I also have a rebuilt generator, so I swapped that in and got the same readings +/- a volt and the idiot light still stays on.
Maybe the Chevy voltage regulator that I chose isn't allowing enough current through to satisfy the idiot light? Or is it really not charging as it should still?
I'm stumped. Thoughts?
So, I dove into the problem by purchasing a new mid 50's Chevrolet voltage regulator specifically for Chevy trucks with generators, a digital multi-meter, and our trusty wiring diagram. Yesterday, I finally got to sit down and try to hook it up. It is marked differently than the Toyota regulator, so I had to dig into the wiring diagram to figure out what wire goes where. There are basically 4 terminals with 5 wires. Ground (to the generator casing), (BATT) Battery, idiot light (comes off the Armature), (A) Armature, and (F) Field. The generator is marked with the A and F if you scrape the residue off of the casing.
So, I have everything hooked up as I think it should be. But my idiot light is still on. I am pretty sure that it is charging though. I put a meter across the battery while the truck is running and get 12.15 volts. When I turn the lights on, the reading drops to 11.75 volts and stays there. If I turn the lights on, it climbs back to 12.15V again. I am not sure on how to check the output of the generator though. I metered it a few different ways and the only way I get voltage looks like itsputting out 3V or so regardless of the engine RPM.
Fortunately, I also have a rebuilt generator, so I swapped that in and got the same readings +/- a volt and the idiot light still stays on.
Maybe the Chevy voltage regulator that I chose isn't allowing enough current through to satisfy the idiot light? Or is it really not charging as it should still?
I'm stumped. Thoughts?