What about if he has a wire from the R terminal to the + side of the coil? Then he would need diode, lamp, or wire to acc. term of ign. switch. The R terminal wire is for byp***ing ballast resistor/resistance wire when starting.
and?? the r terminal is only active when cranking. so the alt get all excitable while cranking, then when it starts the alt is charging and there is 0 voltage through the wire when running. Wont backfeed through the ignition or the alt. However if the diode in the alt goes out it may try to run after the ignition is shutoff, (points only) but its pretty easy to troubleshoot. I have done it this way on just about every street car I have ever wired.
Hey guys, Looking for help on alternators also. This is one of the most informative posts on alternators and it confirms that I have mine wired correctly. I've built a few rods over the years and thought I had it done correctly and this post confirmed it. What's happening is that I've fried my third alternator in as many weeks. I have a Keep It Clean harness and have 1,000 miles or so on this roadster project. I can drive it just fine and it charged perfectly for most of these miles. What appears to have changed is that I added headlights and when I turn them on, within 5 seconds I can smell eletrical wire burning and my volt gauge drops to 10 volts and the alternator is toast. I've replaced the headlight switch and triple checked the wiring through the switch, dimmer switch, and out to the headlights. I'm not blowing fuses in the headlight circuit, just buring up the alternator itself. I don't imagine that anyone's going to say "oh yeah, change this wire to this", but looking for opinions on what would cause such a dramatic action at the alternator level? thanks
New symptom. The third alternator didn't fry, but the fuse that I put in line on the main lug to the starter wire keeps blowing. Alternator checked out on the bench test at the parts store and good at the regulator and the alternator itself. With a 20 amp fuse in line, I can start the car and idle and she doesn't blow right away. As soon as I give her any RPM, the fuse pops.
You have a something grounding out, check all the wires connected to the alt. and quit replaceing the alt until you find it.
I'm all set now. What kind of a ***** would put a 20 amp fuse on a 60 amp circut? That would be me....... Through an evolution of trying this and trying that and rewiring this and rewiring that, I ended up with a 20 amp fuse inline on the main lug going back to the starter. WAYYYY too small for a 60 something amp alternator. On top of that, when the third fuse blew, it didn't blow in the gl*** section but on the end so I kept looking at it, seeing a "good" fuse, and thus trying something else to fix the problem. I took the fuse out of the line going from the main lug to the starter. I now have 14.2 volts while running. Headlights are nice and bright. thanks for the help and support.
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