Got my replacement alternator in the mail yesterday. Installed it today. With AC off i'm not seeing any power issues and I was able to drive the car fine on a long distance.
AC on however, after this driving and in my garage idling, almost kills the car. The idle is worse than before with the car sounding like it's right on the grim edge of stalling. Turning off/on accessories when it's doing this seems to have no effect. I ran out of time today to further test power issues to see if that aspect is truly fixed.
Before the alternator install the idle would be kind of unusually low with the AC on.
I was thinking, could the AC unit's bearings going bad cause something like this? Car will rev and everything it feels sluggish. With AC off it's fine.
It sounds like something, possibly related to the AC system, is causing an abnormal electrical draw. Does this car use a lot of relays? If so, start pulling them out and looking for signs of overheating, like discolored terminals or melted plastic.
I was going say earlier in the thread that a 70 amp alternator is just barely enough on a modern car. Also, I think it would be a good idea to try borrowing a known good battery to see if that makes any difference.
Can you get a wiring schematic for this car? And, have you tried swapping the wiring for the fans? Maybe the motor on the AC system fan is defective.
HappyAndy wrote:
It sounds like something, possibly related to the AC system, is causing an abnormal electrical draw. Does this car use a lot of relays? If so, start pulling them out and looking for signs of overheating, like discolored terminals or melted plastic.
I was going say earlier in the thread that a 70 amp alternator is just barely enough on a modern car. Also, I think it would be a good idea to try borrowing a known good battery to see if that makes any difference.
The new alternator in the car is 90 amp, from late 90s Skylines. The one I bought in particular was meant for a R33 with a RB25 or RB26 engine. It's the highest amp OEM alternator that is a bolt on solution. People put aftermarket audio in these cars that I think would draw way more power than these fans without issue. Basically i'm running the same alternator that would be in a R33 or R34 GTR as well which has way more electrical draw stock.
It has some weird smaller battery with non-US sized terminals so i'll try something else and see if that helps.
I'm trying to avoid having a professional look at it, but it looks like it might be heading in that direction.
I run a 90A on the mx6 because it's what I needed to keep everything happy under full load and well... I dont have anything on the car.
That said, i'd look at a/c now. If not the pump, start checking electrical draw.
Swank Force One wrote:
I run a 90A on the mx6 because it's what I needed to keep everything happy under full load and well... I dont have anything on the car.
That said, i'd look at a/c now. If not the pump, start checking electrical draw.
I was told the following on a Skyline forum
I would say the idle air control valve is gummed up, pretty common. Have a search for cleaning IAC valve.
Going to try that next. Apparently if this is the case turning on AC and some accessories can cause the idle to drop like this.
If this doesn't work i'm going to delve into the AC unit.
Disappointing discovery today. Thoroughly stress tested the car today with AC off, same issues as before. Car died right by my house going 30 mph as I was braking for a stop sign.
Got home and the cooling fan was running, turned on lights/brights 12.1 volts.
Going to contact the people at:
http://www.paladinlasvegas.com/
And ask they either fix it or put the OEM setup back on.
Knurled
PowerDork
9/11/14 5:35 p.m.
Will the car stay running if you keep pedal applied?
Meaning, are we missing the forest for the trees here. Is the voltage dropping because the engine is running slower than the alternator needs to put out anything useful?
My car WILL idle at 700 but because of the tiny crank pulley on it, the alternator does nothing useful below 1200-1500 or so. Your case should not be that extreme but if the alternator doesn't do much below 700rpm and the accessories are pulling it down to 500 because the idle controls aren't working properly...
Knurled wrote:
Will the car stay running if you keep pedal applied?
Meaning, are we missing the forest for the trees here. Is the voltage dropping because the engine is running slower than the alternator needs to put out anything useful?
My car WILL idle at 700 but because of the tiny crank pulley on it, the alternator does nothing useful below 1200-1500 or so. Your case should not be that extreme but if the alternator doesn't do much below 700rpm and the accessories are pulling it down to 500 because the idle controls aren't working properly...
What will happen is that RPM will start to fall and applying throttle will do nothing and it will lose RPMs until it shuts off. It will usually then shut off once it falls to the mid 2000s RPM area.
This happened to me in the past when I was purposely running a low gear and at 4000s RPM. That was in stop and go traffic and it happened over and over again. I don't recall specifically if I was accelerating or decelerating when it was happening then but RPMs were not in the 1000s.
where did they tap the power for the fans? Are the wired on full time? separate relay for each fan ? I know it seems off base but how is the compression in the engine?
stan_d wrote:
where did they tap the power for the fans? Are the wired on full time? separate relay for each fan ? I know it seems off base but how is the compression in the engine?
The engine is fine. I did a PPI after i received the car at a Nissan dealer.
When it comes to electrical E36 M3 i'm dumb, so forgive me if I describe things like I am or use words that don't make sense.
Separate relay for each fan with fuses for each as well. It appears like it was done properly.
I can go back to a stock setup. I just have to spend that absurd money on a fan clutch, get a belt because they didn't give me the belt back, and get a temp sensor, and make sure I have the other parts, and undo their wiring. I don't want it to be $2000 total just back to step 1 you guys told me about these fans that they are E36 M3ty anyways. So I might just have to do that. It just seems at this point a few steps back might actually be a step forward.
I don't trust the people who made this fan setup anymore either so i'm extremely reluctant to go back to them telling them to fix their berkeleyup. They should of known, and tested, before even installing this fan setup that it would be an issue, should they have not? It's just really berkeleying stupid that they tell me the alternator is bad, which is obvious to me at this point that it was NOT, and the car wont run until AFTER they install this E36 M3 and try to charge me $200 for a rebuild when every other place in the city charges $90 at most.
Talked to the guy at Paladin Automotive, who made this, and he thinks it might be a bad ground so i'm going to make another attempt there.
Did you do anything at all with the IAC valve?
On a lot of engines they are active even when the AC is off. Basically, if any load causes the idle speed to go below the speed that the ecm wants to see, the IAC valve opens up to bring the idle back to target rpm. Checking and cleaning that is a very good suggestion.
Did I mention trying a another battery? Seriously, you have an odd, unknown battery off unknown condition and age in an electricity intensive car
HappyAndy wrote:
Did you do anything at all with the IAC valve?
On a lot of engines they are active even when the AC is off. Basically, if any load causes the idle speed to go below the speed that the ecm wants to see, the IAC valve opens up to bring the idle back to target rpm. Checking and cleaning that is a very good suggestion.
Did I mention trying a another battery? Seriously, you have an odd, unknown battery off unknown condition and age in an electricity intensive car
I'll still check these before I go. I just didn't think the IAC is a problem if i'm driving. Battery however could still be.
