Sometimes my car will die when I come to a stop at random times. It only happens right after I stop, it drops to the idle rpm and then might cut out a few seconds later, say at a stop light. I have been monitoring my battery voltage and see that a lot of the time when my car is running it is at about 12.7 volts, when it should be around 14.4. If I turn my headlights on when it's at ~12.7V while running the voltage jumps up the the correct 14.4, and will drop back down when I turn my headlights back off. What the ****?

Could it be a bad voltage regulator? Is this something I can replace by itself or is it an integrated part of the alternator?

 

bump

 

how are you monitoring your voltage??? thats weird. also, what kind of car, mods, etc.

 

Monitoring it with a vafc. (I do not use this for tuning!)

Z6 block, Y5 head, 48/60 T3 turbo tuned with crome...

 

i would try checking the voltage coming out the alternator w/ a DVOM w/ accesories on/off, see if the vafc is just reading the voltage wrong.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by schardbody &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i would try checking the voltage coming out the alternator w/ a DVOM w/ accesories on/off, see if the vafc is just reading the voltage wrong. </TD></TR></TABLE>

I doubt it's reading it wrong. The problem happens when it reads the voltage is low, the problem doesn't happen when it reads the voltage is correct.

 

my wifes car does that ****. i slapped in some left over gauges i had when she first got the car including a voltmeter. anyway car had cel on when we bought it for o2, so any way i finally replace that ****, no more cel and then this f*****g voltage thing starts. so anyway she just leaves her climate fan on low all the time and it stays up a little over 14v. but if the fan , or the headlights or something isnt on that **** will drop to 12v at idle. it hasnt cut off yet though. i read in the service manual the eld will cut back alt output if certain requirments arent met. idunno oh her car is a 95 civic ex d16z6.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by JSPECSIR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">my wifes car does that ****. i slapped in some left over gauges i had when she first got the car including a voltmeter. anyway car had cel on when we bought it for o2, so any way i finally replace that ****, no more cel and then this f*****g voltage thing starts. so anyway she just leaves her climate fan on low all the time and it stays up a little over 14v. but if the fan , or the headlights or something isnt on that **** will drop to 12v at idle. it hasnt cut off yet though. i read in the service manual the eld will cut back alt output if certain requirments arent met. idunno oh her car is a 95 civic ex d16z6.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Interesting, sounds like I should disable the ELD and see if that fixes the problem.

 

always worth a shot.

 

i think it might be your distro, thats what happend to me. After awile, my dizzy just burnt up and died for good

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Otherguy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i think it might be your distro, thats what happend to me. After awile, my dizzy just burnt up and died for good</TD></TR></TABLE>

It's less than a year old, so I hope that's not the problem.

 

Disabled ELD today, same thing happens. Any more input?

 

bump

 

Someone has to have encountered this before?

 

there is nothing wrong with your car. it is suposed to do this. i have searched and searched on this topic and have found the answer. the ecu turns off the alternator when it is not needed. i have found a way to disable that feature, i had a high output alternator on it and with me disableing the ecu from turning it off, the alt went bad.

there is no way for me to tell if what i did caused it to go bad, or if it was just went bad from natural causes.

since then i have had the factory alternator on with the ecu disabled from turning it off and have had no problem.

i will try and find the post where i got my info, you can make your own decision if you want to try what i have done.

 

here is the post i made. just read the whole thing. there is a link in it that tells all about the charging system.

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=1615436

 

Interesting, thanks for the info

Maybe the problem lies elsewhere.

 

FIXED!

I have an A/C switch wired to my ecu for full throttle launch, works the same as if you have a a factory A/C switch.

Keep the switch on, voltage never drops.

Hooray beer!