eskimo10

Ok so here's my story. About a week and a half ago, my car starts acting up. The lights started to flicker and the CD player cut in and out. Well we replaced my battery b/c its been about 5 years and it was about time, and she ran fine after that for about a week or so. Well last night I was driving it to go get some dinner and my car starts actung up again. I have a pretty large sound system in my car, a 1600 watt amp, and two 700 watt rms 12" subs. Well the lights would flicker and dim when the subs hit, and then the CD player would cut out. And whenI went from high beams to low beams the CD player cut out. Is this due to a dying alternator? Or is there something else causing this? I check all my wires this week and the connections were all good, so I doubt its that. Thanks for all your input!

I also had the alternator tested, it pushes normal amos like 70 or 78 or whatever when the amp is off, but like 48 when the lights and amp are on. is this normal?


Modified by eskimo10 at 7:00 AM 3/17/2007

Syndacate

Is your capacitor(s) up to par with your system? How large are the capacitor(s) you're running?

Try disconnecting the subs and see if the problems...that's disconnected, not turned off, unplug everything.

eskimo10

i'm not running any capacitors, but i never have been before and i've never had this type of problem. usually the lights will dim a bit, but not like last night. and i've never had the cd player cut out on me.

eskimo10

Ok more news. I went out today to the movies, and my car started right up and ran with no problems. But after the movie, I coudln't start it, I got no power anywhere. I got a jump and it ran fine except when I turn the lights on. When I turn my lights on the CD player cuts out. And now that I'm inside and the car is outside its dead. I don't know whats going on. Anyhelp is greatly appreciated.

96 EJ8

your alternator is taking a crap most likely, take it to a local shop and get it checked. get a cap for your system or else you'll go through alternators quick.

JDM_Frijoles

Or buy an upgraded one, (2) Build the guts of your current alternator to put out more charge, i know theres a sound shop that has some dude that rebuilds alternators.

da_dude

Here is a way to check if your alternator is good or bad with it still in your car.

1. Start the car and let it run
2. Unplug the negative wire to the battary.

If it die then the alternator is bad. If not, then it's something else.

96 EJ8

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by turb20_vtec &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Here is a way to check if your alternator is good or bad with it still in your car.

1. Start the car and let it run
2. Unplug the negative wire to the battary.

If it die then the alternator is bad. If not, then it's something else.</TD></TR></TABLE>

thats a way to fu*k up the car, NEVER do that the battery acts as a voltage stabilizer doing that can kill all your electronics on the car. Take it to a parts store to check out the car using a battery tester. plz dont give bad advice.

eskimo10

I'm pretty sure that unhooking the negative end of the battery... will uh, screw me over big time and i'll have bigger problems to worry about than this. I'm gonna drop by a parts store and get them to test it, but pretty much I'm just going to replace it with a larger one since this is most likely the cause of my problems at the moment. Are there any tests I can run myself to see is there are any other causes?

eskimo10

I think he meant unhook the positive wire from the battery, because the car runs off the alternator, and when you unhook the battery, is the car dies, then you know you have a bad alternator.