Charging System Light

I was driving home last night and noticed at some point in the minute or two before pulling into my driveway that the Charge light was illuminated in my F150.

Today (Tue., 10/16) I was on my way to bid a job that is 10ish miles from the house. I was thinking that if I had no electrical loads going, I should be able to make the round trip easily, and even stop for repair parts on the flip side. The truck died completely about 3 houses before the one I was going to. It died in stages, various guages went dead starting with the less useful ones and ending in the Speedometer. The windows failed pretty early in the slow shut-down process.

Thank God for the Auto Club.

I checked the main fuse between the alternator and the rest of the universe. OK. Since I had enough power to get where I was going, then I made a leap of troubleshooting and decided the alternator itself must be toast.

I got the alternator on my bench and noticed the diode pack -- regulator -- bolted to the case. I took this off and the brushes fell off. Well, one brush fell off -- literally. It was perhaps 1/4" long, and clearly could not make contact with the armature of the alternator and the housing that holds it. The other brush was severely worn out, but was long enough to do its job, obviously it takes two to get the job done.

I went online to NAPAONLINE.COM and AutoZone.com. Napa listed the brushes as a separate item, but this did not include the housing and I could not see how to get new brushes to stay in place -- both from a mechanical and electrical perspective -- so I looked aty some other parts. The regulator does not get brushes, so the brushes have to be acquired as another part. I found a parts listing for the brushes and housing together for $17 (rounded).

My truck is out in the driveway charging the battery as we speak (sic).

If you get a Charge System light, before you buy a new alternator for $175, take the diode pack offf the side and check the brushes. Autozone did not have a listing for the brushes, I did not make it to the Kragen pages to see what they have. Napa appears to have had the widest selection of parts, but they did not list any of the Brand Names I was expecting to find.

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Jeff Strickland
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