flathead charging issues part II

ok here goes again i have a late flathead with a 12v generator and i have no draw when the car is not on but it seems like then gen isnt charging the battery enough i put a full charge to the battery and after two weeks of driving the car on and off it starts to drain. like the gen isnt putting enough back to the battery could it be im not useing heavy enough wire from my gen to my regulator? what wire gauge should i use? the batt and regulator are new and my gen puts out well over 13 volts
thanks for any help guys

 

Are you SURE the battery's good? Sounds similar to the problems I had, that went away when I replaced the only-one-year-old battery.

 

I second that, since it's a 12 it should be easy to swap bats with your latemodel and see what happens.

 

yeah battery was load tested it holds a charge just fine im just wondering of i dont have big enough wire from the gen to the regulator and from the reg to the batt

 

Not likely the problem...that wire should be heavy enough for max amp load of generator (maybe 40??) in case of heavy charging of a dead battery, but normal daily use imposes only light amperage loads.
As one of several possibles, hook up a small light bulb (or a meter if you're high tech...) and see if there light or even a slight glow visible in dark garage from that bulb when car is entirely off.

 

i have to double check the guage of wire im using but just in case what guage would you recemend?

 

For armature anf bat wires, I'd use 10 gauge...I believe that's excessive, which I like for important circuits.

 

could the motor need/does it have a ground to the chassis?
just throughing out ideas
tk

 

If it is putting out 13 volts it should be fine. What kind of driving are you doing? Remember a generator doesn't do much without higher rpms. If you are idling around in slow traffic and have some draw (lights), the battery can get weak. I used 12 guage wire on mine and it works fine. (It is the heaviest that I had laying around at the time)

Neal

 

On ground, a Ford needs a direct wire from G on gen to baseplate of reg...then lead that to ground cable. You can't have too many ground wires...
What does your amneter do when driving, when you turn on lights, etc.??
Try disconnecting coil and cranking a bit to drain bat, then startitup--this should show some bigger amps on amneter for a few minutes. If it does, start by looking for a current drain as above.