I am running a one wire alternator on 350 motor I ran a wire from the positive outlet to the battery and the negative to a ground on the alternator. When I go to connect the negative on the battery I immediately start burning wire? Do I need to connect the power to another power source and use a relay or is the negative the problem. Any wire diagrams would be helpful and or directions for newby in wiring. Thanks
LOL,, the amp guage reads power thru it, so one side has teh main powerfeed in and the other goes to the main power to the rest of the car, it does not work like a volt guage. Do a search as there are many threads showing how it should be done.
Make sure that the ammeter is rated somewhere in the vicinity of rated current of the alternator. If not you will mess the ammeter up good.
The amp gauge measures current and i don,t see any use for it. Now a Volt meter is much better and hooked from key on to pos terminal.Tells how much voltage you are charging should show over 12 about 13.8 if drawing heavy will be less.
im with george on this onewhy run a amp gauge?its volts that im interested in.like am i over 13 volts? i dont know how many amps i need but i do know i need close to 14 volts to be riding home instead of walkin.
ran AMPs in my HOT ROD Datsun truck for 10 years. I liked AMPs because you are immediately aware of any problem. a volt gauge could drop quite a bit before you notice. lets say your regulator craps out and you are cruising down the hiway with 60 amps showing... might be able to pull over and fix it before you fry your battery. lose a fan belt? your AMP gauge is immediatly showing a problem. with volts you still show 12+ until it starts to get sucked dry. ...besides... AMPs is traditional. go out and search for a vintage volt gauge and let me know what you come up with.
I agree. I use both meters. They each have their own story to tell. It is possible for an alternator or generator to show rated voltage without producing much current. Power (amps x volts) runs your car. You need amperage and voltage or nothing happens. A voltmeter is a much cheaper gauge to put in a car. The wiring is simpler and lighter gauge. They started using them as a money saver. An ammeter tells you the most about your charging system.
coming up in the 50s, I was raised on Ammeters. There are lots of discussions on amp vs volt meter. You won't "convert" most of us old timers. To me ammeters give you much more information. Can a volt meter tell you that your brake light switch is sticking or your door is ajar? My ammeter will. In the 50s-60s they sold 2 gauge panels to replace the idiot lights. They came with ammeters and not voltmeters. I am talking about HAMB cars and not streetrods. If you have a 1000 watt stereo and A/C disregard anything that I say. I always put a fusible link in the main charging line at the battery or the solenoid so that any short in that line is stopped immediately. I lost an ammeter once when an internal short in the alternator burned the whole wire from the alternator to the solenoid. The alternator was toast too of course. The ammeter was the victim of the short and not the cause. Since then a fusable link is a must. My ammeters have saved me several times over the years from a dead battery when I left the lights on. I always check it after the key is off before I open the door. If it's showing a discharge, something is on. A voltmeter can't do that.
Amp and volt meters tell you different things. One isn't better than the other in every way. Both provide potentially useful information. Ammeters have a shunt. The meter measures the resistance created by the shunt. In some cases the shunt is inside the gauge. Most often it is on the outside of the gauge.(The metal strap across the two terminals.) An external shunt can usually be removed and relocated to make it "remote". Some gauges come with a "remote" shunt. With a remote shunt, the shunt is located close to the loads, like near the alternator or battery. From either side of remote shunt two wires go to the gauge. Because the shunt is carrying all the system current, the two wires are only carrying the current needed to operate the gauge mechanism. Oversizing the wires a little can help gauge accuracy, but you no longer need the huge wires needed with a gauge mounted shunt. The two gauge wires are connected to a high potential source, but the gauge draws very little current, so the wires can be protected with very small fuses.
"You cannot have amperage without voltage, but you can have voltage without amperage." Ammeters monitor your charging system which includes the battery, voltmeters essentially only monitor your battery. We have serviced hundreds of ammeters and have never had one cause a problem.
Hmmmm,,well OK then,If I'm running an amps guage(and I am,and a volts guage) My car has a 14 GUAGE,,NOT AMP!,fusable link at the battery. and IF I was wanting to either duplicate or replace this setup I see that mostly there is a small plastic box affair said to be a direct replacement for a wire type fusable link,,ok? now this thing is rated in AMPS not wire guage.With several differing units available with different AMP ratings.This invites the question,How many amps does that 14 GUAGE FUSABLE LINK WIRE self destruct at? ALSO,given that the alternator is a typical early 70's GM unit and doubtful it would ever exceed 60 amps output,,what are the safe perameters for wire guage to and from the guage?Been looking my guage wiring over and although its been fine for many years I'm thinking some renewing might not be a bad idea. Any suggestions or ideas are welcome. thanks.
Stock wiring on the 70s GMs was usually 10 gage wire, with a 14 gage fuse link. Safe load on 10 gage wire in a house is 30 amps, but you can run a bit more than that in a car, so it's not surprising that they used 10 gage wire with the 55 and 63 amp alternators. Also, the alternator rating is the maximum output, and usually it will put out quite a bit less, based on demand (recharging the battery and feeding the stuff that draws current, like lights, ignition, etc) As long as the high current wiring in the car is all 10 gage and the fuseible link is 14 gage, you should be fine. Usually we use 30 amp fuses with 10 gage wire...the fuse is there to protect the wire. You can try a 30 amp, and if it blows occasionally you could move up to 40 amp and see how it works, it should still be safe. I just run an idiot light in my 55 chevy. No need for gages as long as it's working right, and the light will come on when it quits working right. I don't have much in the way of electric accessories...if you have an electric fan, big stereo, power windows, etc you might look at it differently.
johnboy13's diagram is about the only response that has come close to answering your question. A lot of the others are simply re-hashing the age-old non-traditional voltmeter vs the traditional ammeter argument. If you are talking about the ammeter positive and negative in your comments above, what you have done is created a dead short through your ammeter, hence the smoke. You probably haven't done your ammeter any good. What you've described is the proper wiring for a voltmeter. An ammeter should be wired per johnboy13's schematic.
The answer to that question is a graph. At one extreme the fuse link will carry a huge amount of current for a fraction of a second without blowing out. At the other extreme, the lowest rating is the continuous steady state current the fuse link can sustain without failing. In a high current steady state situatiuon the insulation on some fuse links will overheat before the wire inside fails. There are some comments about fusible links in this discussion that might be helpful: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=576401
Check out this article by MAD's Mark Hamilton: http://www.madelectrical.com/electricaltech/amp-gauges.shtml.
MAD's Mark Hamilton doesn't have 100% accurate information on the page referenced in the post above. I'll agree that some of those Mopars with electrical issues did melt some connectors and burn up some ammeters. Very few of the well maintained ones did.
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