Hey guys , a couple moths ago we had -10F weather , truck wouldnt start . It had the orignial batterys . I bought die hard platnuim P-2's , about 400$ for the two . A month later I left a dome light on and the truck was dead . Popped the hood and the passanger side battery positive cable wasnt tightened down and popped off.....so in essence I only drained 1 battery .

Tightened everything up and it started , but its a REAL weak start now , even after it charged up . Somtimes feels like I dont have enough juice to start . After 2 weeks like that I took it to sears to get the batteries replaced . An older/experienced guy told me it was the alternator . So I figured ok maybe with all this I fried it .

Just installed a new alternator from napa , charged the batterys with my charger . Still started REALLY weak . Took it down the road for a test drive and after about 1 min the battery indicator guage goes to 0 and the check guages light goes on .

The batterys gotta be junk , but now I'm thinking I have mulituple problems .

Any ideas???

 

check all your grounds for tightness and CLEANLINESS from engine to batt., batt. to body ext..

 

go back to the older experienced geezer at Sears, tell he is FOS, have him properly LOAD TEST the batteries and check the test results as he is doing it. Test the output of the alternator while the truck is running and make sure that it is putting out 14.5 volts or better. Check and double check your battery connections and grounds. Make sure that it is all gootentight!

Cheers!
Mike

 

Looks like I'm taking this to the shop if I cant figure this out today . A mechanic friend told me it sounded like a bad ground on the alternator . I got another New alternator and a brand new battery on the driver side . Same problems .

Checked the voltage of batterys while running 12.2

Checked output voltage on alternator (by putting hot lead on alternator connection and negative lead to battery) Its reading 32v .


Any ideas?

 

This tells me the alternator is working, but the output isn't making it to the battteries. Check the big charge fuse in the PDC. It sounds like it may be blown.

 

Thank you very much!!! It is blown .

Ok now after charging the batteries on trickle charge I get the batterys upto 12.6 . Even though the fuse is blown it should start like normal correct?It is not .

Im wondering if the low voltage fried the starter somehow . I think I put a new one on a couple years ago . I never save reciepts either . Hopfully I'm in a computer under warranty .

Thanks again for everyones help , much apperciated!

 

Glad you are getting closer to the solution. If you have fully charged your batteries, it should start normally regardless of the blown fuse. It would make sense to me that the lower voltage could have damaged the starter. If it cranks slowly and you can rule out bad batteries, I would do a quick voltage drop test from the batteries to the starter, on the ground side as well as the power side, while cranking. If the starter is getting good voltage then you can assume the starter itself is a problem.