"Check Alternator" Warning

[brooksy741]

check alternator warning, whats wrong

I have a 2002 vy sv6 commodore and I keep having the check alternator light come on, it has been doing it every day for the past month but it seems to go away after 10-20min of driving and nothing seems to be wrong with the car and I'm not sure what to do or if I need a new alternator could someone please help, cheers

 

[malmensa]

Just to clarify, the "regulator" is a plastic thingy, part of the alternator. Besides holding the regulator electronics, it also houses the brushes. There are square graphite rods that make contact with sliprings on the alternator rotor. After some time, they wear down, and eventually no longer contact the slip rings. Failure is thus intermittent to begin with.

If you need too, it is usually pretty easy to take out the regulator, and yank the brushes a little further out of their housing, stretching the braided copper and giving another half mm or so of "grace", so you can put off repair for a week or so.

In theory, you CAN fix this in one of three ways:
1. Replace just the brushes. A bit tricky and requires soldering tools and expertise.
2. The whole regulator. Very simple once you get the alternator out, and usually the best option.
3. Replace the entire alternator. This is the option a lot of auto electricians would offer. Once the brushes are worn, the sliprings usually have grooves around them as well, and new brushes might not seat well. Also, occasionally there is some other problem with the alternator, and it is old anyway. Just replacing the regulator is maybe 80% likely to be a reasonably permanent cure. Auto electricians prefer a more certain outcome, and a recon alternator swap is only a little more expensive.

 

[mpower]

spot on, once you know how an alternator works it removes all the guessing they are a very simple piece of equipment.

 

[malmensa]

I know this is an old thread, but had exactly the same symptoms on my Ecotec VY last weekend. In my case, when I checked the battery voltage, I saw 12.5 with the engine off, 18.1 at 1500RPM.

My guess was a faulty regulator. New one was $70, replacement was easy, maybe 20mins work, and it went fine after that. I would advise against driving around far like that, the battery will actually boil and burst, throwing acid all over the place. Also could destroy other electronics in the vehicle.

 

[Shagybet]

Hey all,

I was just about home this afternoon and the "Check Alternator" warning popped up. It followed with the battery light coming on and the ABS warning firing. About 5-10 seconds later I lost ALL dash lights, radio, speedo, etc. The battery recently came back as a fail when it was tested even though I've had no problems. I've been meaning to change it! Promise!

I got home, turned the car off and restarted. No problems. The check came back as an OK but about 10 seconds after that the same problem hit.

So... my questions are:

1) Could this just be the battery?
2) Could the battery just be a result of something bigger like a buggered alternator?
3) Is it ok to drive to an auto electrician???

Thanks!

Good day! Im having the same problem now what did you do to fix it?
Thanks a lot
Cheers!

 

[krusing]

It will be the Regulator on the back of the alternator,
Brushes have probably worn out,
Relace that and that should fix your problem.

 

[AB 1000]

Yeah we had that with our vy executive and it was the regulator.

 

[krusing]

If you have RE72 Bosch Alternator,
All you need is the Regulator as per Attachment.