Alternator u

[Matthew Currie]

Yes the old Delco alternators were externally regulated. It's rare to find and OEM one that is high amperage by current standards, though. Back in 1969 my Scout came with a 25 amp alternator. I made a huge leap when I found a 55 to replace it with! That's about what you got on a big old Pontiac or Oldsmobile.

Grand Cherokees in the 90's came with the same Nippondenso alternators as XJ's, but usually a bit higher amperage. I had a 93 GC alternator in my 95, and later put it in the 99, after swapping the connectors.

 

[techno1154]

Yes the old Delco alternators were externally regulated. It's rare to find and OEM one that is high amperage by current standards, though. Back in 1969 my Scout came with a 25 amp alternator. I made a huge leap when I found a 55 to replace it with! That's about what you got on a big old Pontiac or Oldsmobile.

Thanks Matthew for refreshing my memory on older GM cars. I grew up in what is now a former British colony. Most of our vehicles for many years had the old Lucas electrics,...starter and generator going both positive ground or negative ground. In the early 1970's the generators were replaced with Lucas alternators all negative ground.

In the early 1980's I liver in the Virgin Islands and worked as a power boat mechanic. I do remember Chrysler engines, 318, 360 and 440 all had externally regulated alternators. MerCrusier, Chris Craft and others that used the GM engines had internally regulated alternators. I do remember though many US cars of that era had regulators bolted to the inner fender or the fire wall. Thanks for that reminder.

As Joe Peters said, the placement of the regulator/s have no effect on the output of the alternator. Rather output is based on the design. Here is where 5-90's expertise come into play.

I had a 90 AMP Denso alternator in my 1994 XJ re-wired to increase the Amperage. I hated it and replaced it with one from a Dakota. The Amperage at idle got less which incidentally is where I needed the extra power. If more power is needed, start alternator designed from the ground up to pot out more power unless the rebuilder is knowledgeable and experienced in doing so.

 

[8Mud]

Thanks Matthew for refreshing my memory on older GM cars. I grew up in what is now a former British colony. Most of our vehicles for many years had the old Lucas electrics,...starter and generator going both positive ground or negative ground. In the early 1970's the generators were replaced with Lucas alternators all negative ground.

In the early 1980's I liver in the Virgin Islands and worked as a power boat mechanic. I do remember Chrysler engines, 318, 360 and 440 all had externally regulated alternators. MerCrusier, Chris Craft and others that used the GM engines had internally regulated alternators. I do remember though many US cars of that era had regulators bolted to the inner fender or the fire wall. Thanks for that reminder.

As Joe Peters said, the placement of the regulator/s have no effect on the output of the alternator. Rather output is based on the design. Here is where 5-90's expertise come into play.

I had a 90 AMP Denso alternator in my 1994 XJ re-wired to increase the Amperage. I hated it and replaced it with one from a Dakota. The Amperage at idle got less which incidentally is where I needed the extra power. If more power is needed, start alternator designed from the ground up to pot out more power unless the rebuilder is knowledgeable and experienced in doing so.

I was having charging issues on my CS 130, in my 88 XJ, while slow speed cruising my hunting lease. I swapped it with a Chevy. CS 130 I had on the shelf. I noticed the pulley was smaller on the Chevy model, but there was still enough adjustment to tighten the belt up. I came to the conclusion my charging issues at low RPM's wasn't an alternator issue but a RPM issue. I doubt they rate the alternators at 600 RPM.

I was thumbing through the books and compared pulley sizes. And found the same shank size and number of grooves in a 10% overdrive pulley and a 15% overdrive pulley, between $15-$22 bucks. Not certain of the offset, it requires more research, but most of the basic measurements are identical for many Ford and Chevy alternators. Even between the CS 130 models and the Denso models. Spacers or cone adapütors may be required, but they are also in the catalogue.

Might be a cheap way to get a higher Amp rating (in the RPM range you need). Maybe a nice project for 5-90 or for somebody with access to a friendly parts store. American parts are not easy to come by around here.

 

[Matthew Currie]

A side drift note on Delco alternators. Back some years ago I knew a guy who know some guys, etc., and the upshot of it was that back in the 70's, when Lotus, which was once based in Millerton NY, had a huge recall of Europa alternators, he got a big box of them. Brand new, working Delco internal regulator alternators. They looked just like the ones in American cars. Nice, eh? Oh wait, though - they were British Delco alternators. Take one apart, and surprise: the rear bearings were half the size of the same American one, and surprise again: the connectors, which are plated brass in American ones, were plated steel in the English ones. When the alternator in my '79 Pontiac blew its input bearing, I picked up an English one, but after five years on the shelf the contacts had corroded so badly it did not work without scraping. I ended up stealing the one bearing I needed and throwing the rest away.