High amp alternator

[bigfish95971]

I bought the Bosch, but there are others.  The thing to is test for AC before purchase or immediately upon installation.

Edited January 15, 2018 by bigfish95971

[skyhigh4by]

I’ve been trying to search without luck but is a Bosch alternator actually a different design than the denso unit? I imagine most commonly reman units are denso? What’s the difference between the two?

[Mopar1973Man]

12 minutes ago, skyhigh4by said:

What’s the difference between the two?

 

Denso is simple to rebuild with basic hand tools where the Bosch has all the diodes soldered in place. 

 

Denso diode pack. Easy bolt on part. Brushes and everything else is easy to replace. 

 

 

6 hours ago, W-T said:

ALSO...guys I lurk around out here...I've seen photos you have all taken "under the hood" of your beloved vehicles...gosh golly!!! The appearance of the battery terminals and cable connectors...it is pretty sad. You can't transfer billions and billions of electrons (with NO heat) through the scum I have viewed. 

 

 

Something like this?

[dripley]

@W-T or anyone for that matter. That was an interesting read even for the electrically challenged. I did not understand alot of the technical jargon but from what I gathered are you talking about something like the below? http://www.mechman.com/alternators/dodge/full-size-truck/5-9l-diesel/1988-2002/

[Mopar1973Man]

This kind of goes along with @W-T was saying...

http://www.mechman.com/hairpin-stators-1/

[GSX455]

The alternator woes seem to be common these days.  I have tried to get the check gages light to go off since I have owned the truck.  I checked the Bosch alternator for AC noise and measured 0.022 VAC, with the 140 amp fuse out.   I cleaned both engine grounds, and I have no PCM error codes.   Both batteries tested good with 500+ CCA and 13.8 volts.  

 

I measured 13.8 volts with alternator charging, and battery voltage was 13.8-14 volts also.   Based on what I have read elsewhere, the check gages light is from improper voltage level on the voltage regulator in the PCM.  Is there another way to get rid of the check gauges light?   Yes, I am electrically challenged, but apparently in good company here.

[bigfish95971]

They look similar but are two completely different manufacturers,  Napa has the brands listed separately, as do others.  But there is less of the Bosch in stock, may have to order.  I usually buy new..

[dave110]

9 hours ago, skyhigh4by said:

So with all that said. Where do we find such an alternator that is up to the task

I'm wondering the same thing. Very interesting article, but in reality %98 of us don't have the equipment or knowledge to 'build' our own alternator. My brand new Bosch still puts out .04 with everything turned on. I hoped for better but it's better than anything else I tried. When the grids hit it jumps to .09. I still say the best way to save the alt. is to turn those grids off unless they are really needed. Unless there is an alt. readily available that will handle the load that is.

[SilverMoose]

On 1/15/2018 at 11:40 AM, W-T said:

Mike is correct...the large current load on these 3 phase hairpin stators in conditions where all the available current is delivered does tax the design of the factory alternators. The diode's are all created on a single silicon substrate to assure uniform junction characteristics. This method allows for the PIV (peak inverse voltage) to closely match across all six diodes in a "three phase" rectified bridge. The old school would be to use individual large stud mounted diodes however; they would have to be curve traced to create a matched set of six diodes with close PIV and forward current avalanche voltage drops. All silicon diode junctions have a .6 volt drop turn-on when forward biased or conduction. Variations of these characteristics cause a dirty wave-form of the desired sinusoidal wave appearance. Hence; we have "ripple" witch is what Mike has explained so many times and why we must avoid this situation. 

 

Our trucks arrived with a "bare minimum" alternator design to get the vehicles off the sales lot. The grid heater configuration along with head lights and a fan blower for heat or defrost on early cold mornings takes the demand for these wimpy alternators to their design limits. Once we begin to "pound or beat" these diodes into forward and reverse current conduction we begin to see changes in the silicon junctions. It is cumulative and in time between hot summer and cold winter conditions our diode bridges become "leaky" and the "ripple" (AC component) becomes excessive and certain electric system devices begin to balk or react strangely with the imposed "ripple" floating on the DC(direct current) rail.

 

Excellent mil-spec electronic devices or space-bound instruments MUST HAVE bullet proof power supplies. PURE DC hard-core power supplies are normal components and can be built without much effort today. Our alternators and dual batteries ARE the DC supplies for our trucks. The error is budget on Daimler/Chrysler's decision to put these 135 amp alternators into the Cummins platform. 

 

The standard rule of thumb for all electronic design regarding power supplies is, "If you have a demand of 100 amps maximum in a given system, you build a supply with 50% more headroom minimum. Now, take conditions into consideration...heat, cold and perhaps a poor matched battery in a dual battery (paralleled batteries) storage supply and the occasional "starter" operation (the Cummins starter is INSANE on current demand!) and WE have a real MONSTER to feed!

 

Boys and Girls...if you want bullet-proof DC, double the available current at idle. Yes...this is correct...go with a 6 phase (twelve diode pack) and a hand-wound "square wire" hairpin-stator. The six-phase stator and companion rotor  will cut the ripple to near zero in conjunction  with proper storage capacity (really good paralleled batteries) you will have the power supply for your Cummins. The "square" wire wind is best for current demand when an "AC field wave-form" is cutting the coil to impose current into the inductive system. It is the cutting edge in design for transformers with high efficiency and LESS HEAT. Heat is "loss" and also destroys the surrounding aspects of the generating device.

 

BTW...not even Nations builds to these specifications....they buy their upper-end higher current devices from a source in Riverside California.

 

Just for grins... 1 Amp...what is this? Electronics 101:

 

Current flow is "electrons" ( remember 5th grade science?) the Atom is composed of three elements the Proton, Neutron and the little Electron flying around the other two elements like an orbiting satellite. It is the "electron" we are interested in when it comes to DC (direct current) when we refer to "current flow" in a circuit.

 

SO...the question is? When we measure "current flow"  the term Amps is used....how many "electrons" flow through a piece of wire at a given point in "one second" ???

 

One Amp is (physics term "Coulomb" ) equals 1x10 to the eighteenth power....hence; when you start your mighty Cummins you are transferring 1x10x18 x 600 electrons in order to spin the Beast into run condition ! Take a look at the size of this number ! This is why you need "FAT" wire to allow all those little (minions) electrons to race at the speed of light through the wire to the given load. 

 

As you can see...current flow is from "negative" to "positive" in our world. The battery has a "positive" terminal and it is "sucking" to become satisfied. It attracts ("sucks") electrons off the frame-rail of your truck "as current flow" in order to spin the armature of the starter motor.

 

SO..."negative" (electrons) flow towards the "positive" (hole or sucking-action)....seems we have an "upside down" world !!!!

 

Now this leads us to another interesting Physics observation...you see...lights Do Not Give Off Light ! They suck "dark" and you will notice when a light bulb "burns out" and no longer provides luminescence....we say "it is burned out" however; we now know that is not true!.... IT IS FULL of Dark and we need a new bulb ...Look at the bulb...it's "dark".

 

Sorry...had to share this funny tid-bit...none the less...our Cummins platforms were not produced with Mil-Spec in mind. Sorry, our ECM and PCM's must be provided "clean" stable DC in order to function correctly. The design guys never considered 6 millivolts  of "ripple" to be critical for converter "lock and unlock" syndrome and yet we see the result and unwanted operational characteristics. 

 

I build killer DC power supplies for various electronic devices...you need a shop oscilloscope to even see the minor "AC ripple" and as for regulation, from zero to 100 Amps at 14.8 volts there is NO DC drop in voltage. It is like taking and engine from "zero" to "red line" in a heart-beat and you don't even see a fraction of a voltage drop...this is called a "Stiff DC Regulated Supply".

 

Build your DC Supply...the Cummins platform is a Nobel Beast....feed it a good stiff DC diet with NO sag and Zero ripple and all will be well.

 

ALSO...guys I lurk around out here...I've seen photos you have all taken "under the hood" of your beloved vehicles...gosh golly!!! The appearance of the battery terminals and cable connectors...it is pretty sad. You can't transfer billions and billions of electrons (with NO heat) through the scum I have viewed. 

 

Again...No worries...we are all in this together... I share this respectfully as intellectual content with just a touch of humor  

 

Cheers

 

 

  

         

Man that was a great read and very informative. Unfortunately my brain hurts now.  

On 1/15/2018 at 5:30 PM, Mopar1973Man said:

 

Denso is simple to rebuild with basic hand tools where the Bosch has all the diodes soldered in place. 

 

Denso diode pack. Easy bolt on part. Brushes and everything else is easy to replace. 

 

 

 

Something like this?

Mike, how did you get a picture from under my hood?

[Mopar1973Man]

4 minutes ago, SilverMoose said:

Man that was a great read and very informative. Unfortunately my brain hurts now.  

 

@W-T did an awesome job on that one post. I had about another 2-hour conversation with him on the phone last night. Awesome guy. 

 

5 minutes ago, SilverMoose said:

Mike, how did you get a picture from under my hood?

 

Man the amount of weird crap and abuse I've seen to vehicles is unreal. When I walked into that Dodge dealer back in 2002 to purchase my truck I realized I was going to spend 32,000 on a truck and I want that truck to last like all the other vehicles I owned. Now everytime I open someone else hood it's like "OMG!" just about every time. Very Very rare to see another truck in as good shape as my own. I do see it but rarely. Prime example was JAG1 when I installed his injection pump and IBMobile was the other very clean and well taken care of trucks.  

[015point9]

I don't think I know enough about elec...but is there any way to install inline diode or soliend to prevent back feeding from poor quality diodes in alt to rest of system?  In others words install a "one way" valve.  

[Mopar1973Man]

22 minutes ago, 015point9 said:

but is there any way to install inline diode or soliend to prevent back feeding from poor quality diodes in alt to rest of system?

 

No. Still the point is the full wave diode bridge is supposed to do that in the first place. In other words, you need to find a way to prevent overheating the diodes in the first place. The biggest killer is starting the truck up and let it idle to warm up and allow the grid heater to continue to bang on the alternator at idle. There is not enough RPM to keep the alternator cool nor is there enough charging current to handle the grid heaters. So like in the mean time I'm leaving the grid heater unhooked because of the amount of time I've got to fire back up just to get heat in the cab while I wait for @MoparMom to complete dialysis. I'm going to figure out a better solution for the grid heaters hopefully to keep error codes from showing and keep the function of the grid heater when needed. 

 

Thinking out loud. Basically, a person needs is a relay to control the ground side of the solenoid triggers but a switch that toggles in a preset resistance for the ECM to see so error codes are not present. So when the grid heaters are disabled the ECM sees a preset resistance load that it thinks is the solenoids. Kind of works similar to the Mopar1973Man High Idle Kit. 

 

No. Because you would have 50% of the sinewave still coming through. So you would end up having a full wave rectifier again in front of the failed one choking the flow again. Still come back to replacing the damaged diode pack and preventing them from overheating.  1 diode will only take care of positive side of the side wave or the negative side so at least two diodes would be needed but now you blocking the DC also. 

 

http://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/diode/diode_6.html

Edited January 16, 2018 by Mopar1973Man

[015point9]

OK...

In mean time I have extra gauge hole in pod.  Was thinking about your pana-pacific temp gauge.  But is there a gauge sensitive enough to mount in pod hole to monitor other than hand held volt meter? (Just thinking)

[Mopar1973Man]

Most likely not for AC noise. You would have to have something that measures less than 1 volt AC. Highly doubt you'll find a AC volt gauge that sensitive. 

 

 

[bigfish95971]

$30 volt meters have a 2v scale that go down to 1/000v

 

Moose, Considering all the problems with AC on alternators, and lots of other cars have similar problems, why aren't generators used instead?

[Mopar1973Man]

51 minutes ago, bigfish95971 said:

why aren't generators used instead?

 

If I'm not mistaken the old generators of the past where a permanent magnet style generator which had no voltage control but made clean DC power. Voltage regulation was crude at best because of the switching style regulators used. AC styled alternators became popular because of better voltage regulation and could produce more power over the old school generators of the past. Voltage regulation still to this day is a variable field armature. 

 

A lot of people are right though. The biggest problem is the factory alternator is too small really for these truck and should be bigger like @W-T mentions. The only problem most of us don't have the deep pockets to buy these alternators or don't know any better and buy reman'ed alternators. A larger alternator would cure the problem but if you can't do the alternator then tha means you gotta cut the load. 

[outlaw7]

So what about using large caps like the stereo guys do to stiffen the ps just curious after reading bill nigh the science guys stuff which btw Mr W T I enjoyed it I play with music electronics so I understand more than some folks but I still feel like you took my bicycle on that one . I've been looking really hard at a complete electrical system overhaul on my 01 it's got 340k on it and I just lunched my ecm and pcm see the 911 for that and so I'm thinking pull and strip the harness completely test it re wrap with better coverings and go from there any thoughts guys. Btw I build my own harnesses I use good wetpaks and other high end components because I am picky about things

[Mopar1973Man]

2 minutes ago, outlaw7 said:

So what about using large caps like the stereo guys

 

That will reduce ripple of a good alternator. Still will not do any good if a diode pack on the alternator is failing. 

[outlaw7]

I was just on nation's website and while they talk alot about build they had no specs from bench runs and the price is spooky high n ty Moparman I figured that might help a system especially the ecm and pcm . Has any body actually tackeled isolating the ecm and pcm on their own special power supply because that's what I'm thinking about doing . Build a bulletproof computer ps for the VP ec and pcm. I realize alot of r&d would be required but I ain't scared of that hmmmmmmmmmmmm project time.

[Mopar1973Man]

Small problem how do you keep the AC noise from bleeding over into speed signal devices like speedometer and tachometer signals like this video shows? Still you come back to fixing the source of the AC noise. The failed diodes in the alternator.