A thread for my ignorant wiring questions...
Posted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 2:00 amI'm in the middle of rewiring the dash on my Federal Sprint to fix a myriad of issues So far, so good on what I've tested, outside of one circuit. I'll ask for help from the hive on that one, but use this thread for any others that might come up.
So, the issue now is the alternator light. Turn the ignition to "on", and it should light. It was originally on the white circuit, I'm putting it on the green (white/fused) circuit, fwiw. It's grounded by the brown/gold wire coming out of the back of the alternator, which is at ground with no alternator output, and sees the alternator output. So when alternator output is approx battery voltage, the light goes out.
So that's my understanding of how it should work. It worked before I tore into the wiring. Now it doesn't. And the reason is that the terminal in the alternator that the brown/gold wire connects to has 5k ohms between it and ground. If I disconnect the brown/gold at the alternator, and ground it, with the key on, my light comes on. Remove the ground and insert it back into the alternator, and no light. The alternator case itself is perfectly grounded - 0 ohms between it and the ground wire at the dash (when I ground the brown/gold on the case, the light works).
The alternator is the DBE conversion, with the original 2-wire plug on the back with brown/gold and white wires. Nothing has changed about it during this rewire operation.
I must be missing something pretty simple, but I'm stumped. Any ideas?
So, the issue now is the alternator light. Turn the ignition to "on", and it should light. It was originally on the white circuit, I'm putting it on the green (white/fused) circuit, fwiw. It's grounded by the brown/gold wire coming out of the back of the alternator, which is at ground with no alternator output, and sees the alternator output. So when alternator output is approx battery voltage, the light goes out.
So that's my understanding of how it should work. It worked before I tore into the wiring. Now it doesn't. And the reason is that the terminal in the alternator that the brown/gold wire connects to has 5k ohms between it and ground. If I disconnect the brown/gold at the alternator, and ground it, with the key on, my light comes on. Remove the ground and insert it back into the alternator, and no light. The alternator case itself is perfectly grounded - 0 ohms between it and the ground wire at the dash (when I ground the brown/gold on the case, the light works).
The alternator is the DBE conversion, with the original 2-wire plug on the back with brown/gold and white wires. Nothing has changed about it during this rewire operation.
I must be missing something pretty simple, but I'm stumped. Any ideas?