Rough night -- fried alternator

[jhiestand]

Last eve we hit the water between weather fronts and got in about 6 sets before rough weather caught up to us. Some pretty heavy rain caught us before we could get our rider in so I was a little rushed. Turned on all three (self-primer) pumps, the stock aerator pump, plus the stereo was still on. Blasting back to the dock started to smell a burning smell. (OH NO, hope that isn't us!!). Quickly shut down and opened the hatch and the alternator was smoking like a chimney. Actually, it was probably shot at that point and the belt was smoking trying to turn it. The belt gave way and we made it back the (thankfully) short distance to the dock. Towed 15 minutes home in the rain and had a somewhat somber wipedown session. :|

Last spring I swapped out the 50amp alternator that came stock on my 01SAN with a direct replacement 100amp unit from my dealer. I'm 99.9% sure I installed it right and I thought it was running like a champ. Is there any chance I goofed the install? Could the alt have been a lemon or did I just hit it with too hard running a bunch of stuff at once? Figured I'd check here as to whether I actually have some sort of electrical problem I need to track down, or whether I just need to replace the alternator and make sure I baby my new one since they apparently are kind of delicate?

[Rick]

RE: Rough night -- fried alternator

I think you need to check the battery also. If the battery failed due to the high draw the alternator would have smoked tryig to keep up.

[Grant_West]

Joe: A alternator is a pretty easy hook up. I doubt you hooked up the wires wrong and if you did some how manage to hook them up wrong It would pop right away. I have found that most problems with HO alternators come from the V beltslipping . This can cause a Smoke Out. That belt has to be super tight a good way to tell if you belt is tight is check and see if you can turn the alternator by pushing down on the blades of the alternator fan if the fan/pully spins in any way the belt is not tight enough. You should be able to turn the motor with the alternator belt, That is if your not hitting TDC on a cylinder. But Im guessing you get the point.
I use a Huge screw dirver to pry on the alterntor to get leverage on the alternator to make the V belt tight enough.

[Grant_West]

If you wann be Big Pimpin you can get a set up like this LOL

[Flux]

What do you have as far as pumps and stereo??

Three simers or ballast puppies?? Plus the belly tank aerator?? The aerators use about 6 amps each. Depending on the type of ballast pumps you have, they are in a similar range.

What kind of amplifiers in the boat??

As you increase the amp load on the alternator you are going to increase the mechanical resistance across it. Like grant suggested, your belt was probably worn or loose and it started to just slide through the pulley. Your alternator could be OK, just your belt was fried. Also check the state of your batteries, if they were low to begin with, they would add more strain on the alternator.

If your stereo has some sizable amps, it may be wise to turn off the stereo when all the pumps are going. Even at low gains, amplifiers use a fair amount of power as they become less efficient at low volumes.

One thing I have noticed about Nautiques is that they use small wire gauges in general. I am in the process of rewiring my ballast system so I have three switches to tweak it on the fly. They used 16 gauge on all the aerators and I found that there will be a decent voltage drop, i am replacing it all with 14 ga. so I maintain better voltage. Less volts = more amps to get the equivalent power.

Here's a site that talks about marine wiring

http://www.cncphotoalbum.com/doityou...ing/wiring.htm

[jhiestand]

Grant, I saw your new setup and of course, my jaw hit the floor! Actually, I use a really long socket wrench to get serious leverage to tighten the belt. I must admit though, it didn't even dawn on me that the belt could've just given way. It was pouring out, had to trailer home in the monsoon and wipe down entire boat, plus the rear storage areas and engine compartment STUNK of burnt rubber (& ozone?). I didn't even look for the belt. I was just disgusted and went for the closest beer.

I was running three Simers and I have two Hifonics amps, a BX1500D (only at 2 ohms so maybe 900W) and a ZX6400 (650ish Watts), plus one aerator pump. All things being equal, that doesn't seem like a ton of load for a 100amp alternator, but I prolly should've turned off stereo. The amps are new for this season. Last season I had a single Kicker 700.5.

Dumb question, how can I check the state of my batteries? One thing I did do when I got home was plug them back into my BatteryTender Plus and it seemed to have gotten them topped back off w/out problem -- it's currently on 'float' mode.

I guess first thing I'll do when I get home this eve is check out the alternator. Is there a recommended way to do that other than look for burn marks?

[jhiestand]

BTW, I know someone here on PN found an issue with the wiring to the dash pod being too small. I've encountered issues with that too when running my heater, but haven't had time to monkey with putting in a larger power lead.

NOW THAT I'M THINKING OF IT, I installed a C100 combiner and additional battery in my boat this spring, and my amps and the three Simers are directly wired to the house battery. So in last eve's scenario, it would seem that if my starter battery was low the combiner would've isolated it and the alternator shouldn't have had a tough job. Now if the house battery was low, that would've been a different story (and probably was the situation).

[Grant_West]

Joe: Im guessing you Smoked a alternator belt and not the alternator. The only time you smoke the alternator is when your batterys are low 12.0 or lower and you place a large load on them like a stereo or somthing for a period so if your batterys were dead flat and you were pumping your systyem Yes you might have smoked a belt and then the alternator. Been there and done that like 5 time's NO MORE

Now with my new charging system 210 amp's I can re-charge dead batterys at a 70 amp charge and play my system at full volume at the same time. Yeaaaaaaaa That thing is PIMP. but or gonna pay to play with a system like my'n will set you back $3000.
but Im telling you for me its totaly worth it. While everybody is limping back to there chargers Im still pumpin and blasting a boat full of LED's LOL

a lazy to chek the state of battery charge standing voltage, With your boat not running
Full charge 12.7 or higher
Half charged 12.4
3/4 empty 12.2
Then from 12.2 and lower its time to charge back up again.

Or you could buy a $200 Xantrax link 10 and that will tell you EXACTLEY the state of charge while under load in real time. I have one and its awesome


A easy way to see if your chargeing is what does your voltmeter say. Your dash voltmeter should be reading 12.5 or higher then when your running it should be reading 13 plus

Another way to check and see if your alternator is working is .

with the key OFF place a metal screwdriver near the shaft of the alternator pully. You should have NO magnetive pull on the metal shaft.
With the key ON you should feel a magnetieve field on or around the shaft of the pully



I

[jhiestand]

I'm strongly suspect you're giving me false hope, Grant!! I'll keep my fingers crossed it was just the belt, but for some reason or other I'm suspect that the STINK and the SMOKE were more than just the belt. More like the alt froze, then the belt started its smoky death spiral.

[Rick]

I would suggest you pull the altenator it should be easy without the belt. then take it to any auto supply. They should be able to test it.

[Flux]

Your ballast is probably sucking 20-25 amps for all the pumps and depending on the volume, your amps could easily pull another 100 amps. If you were out on the water running the stereo hard you probably had some drain on the battery. Everything was good until you flicked on the ballast and put the system over the top. The alternator probably started to strain and burned up the belt.

Is this the first time you ran it with the new amps?? Add up the fuse ratings on your amps and that will tell you what they are capable of drawing. I think you simply went over the top. you can check your batteries state of charge with a voltmeter. I can't remember the exact numbers and percentage of charge. Once you exceed the 1000 watts total range on your amps, you are in a whole new world of electrical systems. Thus, Grant's sick and wrong electrical system.

[Mikeski]

Joe,

I will throw in my 2 cents. I tend to agree with Grant and doubt that you fried your alternator. Grab the pulley and give it a turn. It if spins smoothly without any grinding noises then put the belt on, hook up the fake-a-lake and give it a try.

For the long run I might suggest you upsize from the C100 to a bigger combiner. The throughput for a C100 is only about 40 amps. It's probably OK for stereo alone or pumps alone but not both. Next you might want to re-think your ballast system? I am not a big fan of impeller pumps because they are power hogs plus they require maintenance. Once you get an impeller pump system working correctly it's nearly foolproof (and nearly silent). Another option is to wire your pumps off your starting battery, I like mine this way.

Next, I would suggest that you add a digital voltage meter dedicated to your stereo battery bank. This one works really well, great $25 investment, easy to hookup too: http://www.lascarelectronics.com/pro...TOKEN=49933503 It works like a fuel gauge for your battery. No more guessing.

[jhiestand]

Good call on pulling the alternator and having it checked. If I do get lucky and it's just the belt, I guess that will be another item to add to my onboard toolkit!

[lukeduke95]

Thats where a bracket like mine comes in handy. No need to worry about the belt pulling the alternator back over. Those flat bars that the bolt clamps onto end up getting grooves in them and the bolt slides over into them.

Not a lot of cost, lots of adjustment. SUPER TIGHT!!

[Rick]

Great Idea. !!!! Very nice bracket LD95.