Hottie alternator.

[gordon_s1942]

Drove over a kilometre from a Doctors rooms to the local shopping centre and as she went to turn the Motor off, Missus complained of a strong acrid smell followed by her saying there's smoke coming from under the bonnet to me seeing more issuing from the Passenger's side to her popping the bonnet allowing more to escape!!
To cut to the chase, it seems the alternator was the cause with it.
For those who know Fords, this is an AU11 and the power steering pump and reservoir sit directly above it and well known for spills and leaks of the power steering oil into the alternator but not this time as there no leaks visible.

Today this drove some 20 kms from Home to the Doctors rooms without any indications of any problems, sat for an hour while I was Poked, Prodded, Slashed and gashed when they were removing a small skin cancer.
But that short 10/15 minute drive to the Shopping Centre was the killer it seems.

This alternator was fitted in November 2009 due to the previous one failing, funnily enough on almost the some route and in the same car park.
Is it trying to tell me something?

Both it seems have failed WITHOUT any prior warnings such as lights on the Dash or other indications.
It just stopped charging and until there was so little power that the radio went off when I used the Turn indicators (I kid you not) I had no idea I was running purely on the battery !!
My genius youngest Son who has just sorted this out for us spun the shaft and it sounds like its shot big time.............cost me nothing to replace this time as earlier this year I bought a whole wagon for a $100 for spares.
The one that just failed cost near $400 for a new replacement, fitting and GST.

As luck would have it we still had about 500ml of water in a 1 litre container as we normally carry some for drinking purposes and that was enough to put out the bit of fire I think was feeding off the wire varnish on the windings.

Happy days eh???

[Uncle Fester]

Well it is good that you were "prepped".
A whole spar car for parts and water to extinguish was thoughtful planing not luck
I always have a small fire extinguisher and first aid kit with hemostatic powder under my driver seat.
In the back usually 2.5l of water, a large roll of gaffer tape and nylon stockings. People have 'fixed' aircraft with gaffer tape.

OK I also have a fairly complete set of tools in the back and I built an acoustic alarm when my motor temp rises above a certain threshold.
IMO something that should be standard with every car.

...oh and a bright LED digital voltmeter near the dash.

[iannic52]

I built an acoustic alarm when my motor temp rises above a certain threshold.
IMO something that should be standard with every car.

Are you able to share the circuit and perhaps pic's as I would be keen to make one

[lsemmens]

I keep a small tin of petrol in the boot for an engine fire..........

Seriously, we had a small engine fire some years back, and I DID throw petrol on it. Not intentionally, just my stupid. I grabbed the wrong Jerry can. a 10L RED one as opposed to the 20L Green one. The insurance company, fortunately, saw the idiocy of it and paid out.

[Uncle Fester]

I built an acoustic alarm when my motor temp rises above a certain threshold.
IMO something that should be standard with every car.

Are you able to share the circuit and perhaps pic's as I would be keen to make one

Well you asked for it ,
I hope Gordon doesn't mind, after all this thread is about things getting hot.

This was one of my quick and nasty ones that I did in my head with no docos.

It is just a little $1 PIC micro I programmed that makes two-tone beeping noises at two consecutive thresholds.
One early warning that you set with the trimpot and a hot engine after a longer ride up a hill or something, then suddenly stop and leave it idling
while you adjust the pot just below it starts to buzz.
The second warning with more energetic sounding beeps will be about 10˚ above that.
The bright LED will also warn you, it blinks twice on start up self check and there will be straight away buzzing if the sensor has gone open circuit with +12V on the input.
It is designed for the temp sensor that is used in your engine, mine has 77Ω @ 25˚C.
If your sensor is a lot higher you would need to make the impedance of the input circuit higher but I am then not sure about false alarms from the ignition but I don't think these temp sensors differ so much.
It would make no sense to make them Hi-Z because EMI would also become an issue for the ECU.
Then again I don't have much experience about modern cars, my Nissan diesel is 20 y/o and still going strong and I want to keep it that way until I can afford a large EV, or better ESUV.

Enjoy the images and I uploaded the HEX for the PIC if you (or anybody else) would like to venture into this AT YOUR OWN RISK. I just took the schematics off the board because I do not remember writing it down when I built it so check it, but it is very basic in my typical KISS style.

...and do NOT omit the Polyswitch !

HEX file for the 12F683:


The squiggles:




Guts Parts:





Guts Copper:




Finished:

[VroomVroom]

I built an acoustic alarm when my motor temp rises above a certain threshold.
IMO something that should be standard with every car.

I use one similar to this -

cant find the link now but its meant for aquariums and has settable temperature thresholds.

and Engine Guardian or Engine Watchdog does a good job too

[admin]

I keep a small tin of petrol in the boot for an engine fire..........

Seriously, we had a small engine fire some years back, and I DID throw petrol on it. Not intentionally, just my stupid. I grabbed the wrong Jerry can. a 10L RED one as opposed to the 20L Green one. The insurance company, fortunately, saw the idiocy of it and paid out.

Wow, an insurance company with a sense of humor who thinks throwing petrol on fires is funny ?? !!!

Sign me up

[enf]

Well it is good that you were "prepped".
A whole spar car for parts and water to extinguish was thoughtful planing not luck
I always have a small fire extinguisher and first aid kit with hemostatic powder under my driver seat.
In the back usually 2.5l of water, a large roll of gaffer tape and nylon stockings. People have 'fixed' aircraft with gaffer tape.

OK I also have a fairly complete set of tools in the back and I built an acoustic alarm when my motor temp rises above a certain threshold.
IMO something that should be standard with every car.

...oh and a bright LED digital voltmeter near the dash.

Mine is a little different, but similar. A pump. Rattle gun, a few basic tools, heavy duty gaffer tape, a couple of occies...and a fairly long length of rope. You'd be surprised how often a rope comes in handy, providing you know how to use it....and young people are still trying to untwist their straps as you drive away with the load securely tied...

[Tom Mix]

Had a 1971 Fairlane 351 where the batt pos cable suddenly turned red hot & car stopped. Was a diode in alternator dropping onto earth. Auto lec installed a fusible link to stop it occurring again. Would have thought modern falcons with their multitude of fusible links as standard would have protected the car . Alternators these days are high powered (100 A on Falcons) to cope with the high loads that modern cars have with things like computers, efi, ABS brakes etc. Consequently, the alts life can be relatively short. The cheapest way to a replacement alt is to ebay a fully recond one for $130 which I did for my 97 XH 4litre van.