Battery issues

[v10CodeMonkey]

I've got an odd problem that has crept up this week. A few days ago, while driving home (a 10 minute drive) my battery light came on and the gauge was showing about 11.5-12 amps. I drove it on home, which was another 5 minutes, and put the car away. On the drive home the gauge never moved much from the 11.5 to 12 mark. I had the original battery in the car (2008) so it was 6 years old, I just figured it finally decided to die.

I bought a new battery the next day, installed it and fired it up. The gauge slowly climbed back to above 14 amps and idled for a bit then dropped back to around 12 and the battery light came back on. I shut it off, disconnected and reconnected the battery and fired it up again and it slowly (about 5 or so seconds) climbed up to above 14 amps and stayed that way while it idled for few minutes. I didn't have time to take the car out so I shut it and just assumed it was the connections that needed wiggling.

Well, today I figured I test it out on a longer drive. I took it out and drove it around for about 15 minutes and all was good and then bam, freakin battery light popped up again, amps at around 12. I continued driving it for another 10 minutes since I was a good distance from home and the gauge never seemed to waver from the 12 amp mark. Got home, re-wiggled the wires, fired it up, gauge climbed above 14 and all was fine again. I took it out for another 10 minute drive, cranked the AC up and everything and it held at about 15 amps the whole time. Shut it off, startted it a half our later and the the guage never climbed above 12 this time. Shut it off. Clueless as to what was going on, I took the new battery out, returned it and went to Sears and got a different one just so I could rule out the battery as being the issue. Put the Sears Diehard in, fired it up, gauge climbed to above 14 then after about 30 seconds fell to 12 and battery light. Rinsed and repeated one more time, same results.

Any ideas? Does it sound like an alternator? I would assume if it was the alternator it would just keep draining, not drain to 12 and stay there. Any ideas are appreciated.

[Redx]

Sounds like your alternator regulator shit the bed, unsure if it's separate from the alternator on these cars.

[EZ 2B Green]

FYI: The gauge reads Volts not Amps. So when you read 12 that means 12 Volts. If your system voltage is less than 12.5 when your Viper is running then you have a charging issue. If you install a discharged battery in your Viper expecting your alternator to bring the battery up to 100% charge, you will likely damage your alternator if it isn't already bad.

[sparkrn]

Sounds like your alternator regulator shit the bed, unsure if it's separate from the alternator on these cars.

Everything is contained in the alternator, a quick rebuild should do the trick.

[v10CodeMonkey]

Thanks for the help everyone. So is the rebuild something I can have any local shop do and still get the OEM internal parts or are there recommended Viper rebuilders out there that I can ship to for relatively the same cost? I saw someone post about Mean Green on the other site but haven't looked into them yet.

[v10CodeMonkey]

One thing I forgot to add to the original post, there are 2 codes being thrown intermittently since I first replaced the battery a few days ago - P2502 and something else that I'm drawing a blank on right now. Both of these cleared on there own after 3 cycles with the replaced battery then popped back up after a few more cycles.

[v10CodeMonkey]

Looking for rebuild kits online and not seeing anyone that has them for the Gen IV's. If anyone knows where I can find one, let me know.

[JonB ~ PartsRack]

PartsRack can send you a good, used g4 alternator....... $139+SH ....CAN SHIP TODAY


GOOD JOB choosing a DieHard..that rules out crappy-battery-syndrome

[Bill Pemberton]

Will put in a good word for Jon if he can get you a used alternator for that. Just put a new one in my ACR ( had your symptoms ) and the key word on a new one is ...........ouch !!!

[v10CodeMonkey]

Well, I may have solved it tonight. My friend and I took the alternator out and over to Autozone (yeah, I know...) for a bench test and it checked out good. This won't tell if a diode is bad but it did tell me if it was the regulator and it said it wasn't. I realize bench tests aren't the end-all be-all, but I took this as a good sign. so then we started thinking about what has changed on the car recently. I put the ACRX headers on about a month ago and we were removing the ground wires when taking off the starter. So we look at the starter and sure enough, one of the bolts holding the ground was loose just enough to give the wire some play. We tightened it up and took it for a short test drive and all was good. Let it sit for a while, then took it out for a longer drive with no issues, then another drive and still reading regular voltage. SO, the problem MAY be fixed, I'm going to drive it a bit more this week and keep an eye on gauge to see how it does.

Thanks JonB for letting me know about the alternator, if it turns out I still need one you will be getting my call!!

Bill, did the new alternator completely clear up your issues?