Ok so my 61 Sunliner might possibly be possessed. It was running fine a month ago, went to start it after not running for a week..nothing, dead, and I mean dead. Put a charge on the battery, got it running, while out for a drive guy says hey your brake lights are on hmmm ok. Had the wife look while I pumped te pedal and they went on and off, but I replaced the switch just in case..oh and put a quick dis connect on the battery just in case. Well went to park it a few days ago..damn brake lights were on again..only thing not new in the system are the front rubber lines, ordered those and will install and bleed system, and adjust brake rod....now here's where I need help. Took the family to dinner and to soccer..drove to the shop with the heat on, about 5 miles, shut the car off, went to get in...dead! Not enough juice to fire it...I'm thinking must be a bad generator? Why else would it not charge? I pull the cable when ever it sits for fear of a electrical draw. I think I should just put a alternator on it, more than enough power to keep it charged up...so help me what do I need to get at the parts counter? What GM 1 wire alternator do I need to ask for? What belt? I need to try to do this by Saturday or I'm driving a minivan to Sins of Steel! If any Detroit folks wanna drop by the shop...got pop, beer, and BBQ for ya..ha- ha
My only concern would be what else ties into the voltage regulator, but any alternator from (I think) 74 and newer is a 1-wire that simply goes right to the battery or positive side of the solenoid (better place, maybe). But about that brake light issue, is it a "liquid" switch or mechanical? I don't remember on the early 60s Fords. If it's the pressure type, the replacements are junk. CCCA folks have had to fight those things for a long time now as many of them use pressure switches. If it's pedal operated under the dash there's got to be some form of adjustment you can do. Had an old Firebird that had the mechanical switch mount ******ed up. Now and then it would work loose to the point of activating the brake lights. I ended up getting one from some bigger GM car that had to be jammed into place to stop the problem. If I weren't so freakin buried in work I'd spend an evening on it with ya. Sounds like simple problems.
Take your car to napa and see if they can check your battery and generator. If you have a voltmeter you should be charging a 13.5 at the battery terminals. Could just be a voltage regulator. Of course you should know to check all positive and negative leads. Also check grounds from engine to frame. body to frame and body to engine. If you end up changing your voltage regulator be sure to polarize it.
not all alternators are "1 wire" http://www.madelectrical.com/electricaltech/onewire-threewire.shtml However, it sounds to ME like you've got a short somewhere... I'd start checking why your brakelights came on. That could have just toasted the battery. Have napa check it.
Electrical is not my strong suit...I'm not ashamed to admit it! The switch is the old hydraulic type on the master, yeah they have a history of goin bad, my f100 did the same thing..this 61 has got me scratching my head...oh also replaced the starter solenoid, because I had one and know they like to act up.
Fix the brake lights first. an alternator wont fix that. I'm an admitted generator lover on old cars but if your problem is a run down battery from stuck brake lights, spending money on an alternator conversion is a waste of money. IMHO Whatever is keeping your brake lights on will still run the battery down after spending all that money.
well that's the weird thing the brake lights weren't stuck yesterday..checked several times and if they were it was while the car was running..wouldn't the generator compensate for that? when the car is parked I pull the cable..would blasting the heat for 5 mile kill it? car was running fine, just wouldn't fire after I shut it off, going to charge the battery up today and get a tester and start seeing what I got....did I mention I hate electrical? I think the brakes can only be 2 things the old rubber lines are swollen and acting like a check valve.. they slowly let fluid back into the system. becacue after I found it to be stuck I cam back a couple days later, hooked up the cable..not on! the other thing I will do is pull the master from the booster and adjust the rod about a 1/8 inch towards the interior and see if that helps.
That brake light switch works on pressure, not position. The replacement parts burn out at a fairly rapid rate. You may be able to find it online, but someone in the CCCA used a relay of some kind to lessen the load on the switches and they claim it's the **** (in today's vernacular a good thing). Personally I'd hit up a junk yard and jerk a mechanical switch from under the dash of the oldest car you can find. There's a few oldies at the "Parts Galore" in Flat Rock and they stay open until sunset. If you do just replace the pressure switch for now it may last you 3-4 months, may last you 3 weeks, may never fail. Are you lucky at playing ****s?
Did you at any point rewire the car? I have seen, (mostly in drag racing) where a fresh wired car wouldn't charge the battery and had your symptoms. The cause was, The wire used to charge the battery was to small. The battery never achieved full charge, the alternator kept getting hot, and it was a viscious cycle of headaches..... Just throwin it out there.... If your batteries fine, run the generator on the car, put a volt meter on the battery? run it for a while incase heat causes the failure if there is one....
Getting a voltmeter and doing some digging tomorrow. Like I said out of fear I disconnect the cable when the cars parked in case of a parasitic draw..no sparks when cables are connected though and isn't that a sign of a draw ? Again car ran fine drove 5 mies with fan blowing heat at me no radio, lights, just the juice for the blower motor. Car is stock wiring all looks good. Dearborn cl***ics sells a harness to wire a alternator into the current wiring set up. And lie I said brake lights were not on and if they were on if the car is running isn't a generator still compensating for that draw while charging the battery?
I am not a fan of one-wire alternators. They have engagement and charging deficiencies at lower RPMs. Your wiring should look like the above half of this: If you want to move up to an external regulator alternator, see the bottom half. If you want to use an internal regulator alternator, you can use the yellow-with-black wire to excite the alternator, the big terminal goes to the battery, or somewhere the battery attaches to, like the solenoid.
Hi! Before replacing generator to alternator try to perform following simple measurements: 1st start engine, switch your multimeter to volts, connect its terminals to battery and check if voltage is about 13.5 to 14.7 V. If it is OK, than stop engine, switch multimeter to amps (select range 0-20), disconnect one wire from battery, connect one terminal to battery. And other to disconnected wire. Current shoud be about 0amps (ignition shoud be switched off). If it is not equal to 0 and is more than aprox 0.05 Amps - this is the reason why your battery dies.
Where are some obvious places to look for draws? I mean lights would stay lit correct? The radio is non operable so it stays off, the convertable mech is unhooked due to a bad motor, I so wanted to drive it to Sins this year, gonna get a voltmeter tomorrow, I did notice the gen light barely lit and got brighter as I juiced motor...please tell me it's a bad generator..thoughts?
i hate wiring,hate it! madelectric helped me more than i can say! great guy will talk you thru the whole thing.did i mention that i hate wiring!
Just did this with a 170 ci Ford Falcon. It's simple, really. You WILL need to make up a bracket, but, on mine, i was able to use most of the original bracket, modifying what I needed. I used a GM large case alt, like from a Chevette (you don't need a lot of juice), and rewired the Ford by simply switching a couple wires. I thought I wrote a tech piece, but I HATE the way some here love to tear you up on tech I KNOW is good, so I usually don't write tech. IF you're interested in the specifics (and photos), PM me. I DID write a tech on relaying brake lights, like last week. Cosmo P.S. This Falcon is my wife's daily, so it HAS to be dead nuts reliable. It is.
I just did that too, on a Ford Falcon 144. Used a 10Si GM three-wire 100A alternator. I need a lot of juice. Super easy. P.S. This Falcon is my daily, so it HAS to be dead nuts reliable. It is.
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