A few of us have used Boyle Future Tech:
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f116...r-pics-140704/

 

Just got in from testing it again.. 12.8 before starting and 13.8 after starting. Turned the lights on and it drops back down to low 13 in less than 60 seconds. Revving the engine brought it back to 13.6 but it never went above 13.7 even with the lights off and at least 3k rpm's.

Does that sound normal? Maybe it's just not charging intermittently when I drive it or something?


Looking at the prices there I guess it'd be just as easy and cost effective to go with the one from the store =(

It'd just be nice to know for sure the alt is the problem.. but with a new battery and tight connections what else would it be?

 

What happened about this?

 

never found exactly where it goes because there's more than one wire going into that conduit, but the first wire coming out of it bolts to the frame not far above the skid plate.. I'm half way into taking the alt out now, the top bolt is giving me problems. I always over tighten things.

 

If you're not sure I'd make another one then, it never hurts to have redunant grounds even if you do have one already.

 

im sorry you spent 22 dollars at toyota stealership. those brushes are 3$ a set at napa.

 

Got the new brushes out and put the old ones back in which still made pretty hard contact anyway..
Took it to advance auto and they tested the alt, he said he's never seen one test that low haha.

Put the new one in and made sure the battery is charged up. I'm going to start it up tomorrow and let it idle for a while to check the voltage. The guy down there said I could bring it there and they'd check the charging system for free to make sure it's all working right.

I really need to replace the belts but I haven't ever done that or found a write up on it.. wonder if it could be much harder than replacing that alternator=p


I'll definitely look into that. What type of wire would you use for it? Seems like I could just use a 2 ft piece and fasten it on the inner fender with a screw.

 

Yeah, the factory wire is just screwed to the inner fender. Any kind of copper wire, the bigger the better. Use at least 10-12 gauge. If you don't have any wire that big you can use 3 or 4 smaller wires (like 14 gauge) with the ends twisted together. Crimp on loop connectors on each end to put the screw or bolt through. Remove the paint from the spot you screw it to the body.

 

Are the ones at NAPA just the brushes, or the whole holder? I can get the brushes themselves around here for $3-8, but you have to route everything and solder them in. It was worth it to me to pay $18 to not have to do that.

 

... I can't win

Started the truck today and I haven't had it start that quick in a long time. The amps were 14.4 and as the idle dropped to 650 they were staying around 13.95 even if I revved it. So all that was looking good..

Now there's acid pouring out one side of the battery! There's already a small puddle in the tray it sits on..

The right side might have looked a little wet too, but not enough to pour out.

So... Is the battery shot from being drained a few times with the bad alt?
Is the new alt charging it (hopefully) correctly making the dying cells go crazy? haha...

As I mentioned before it's not speced for the truck, the battery that I needed wasn't in stock. Thought it wouldn't matter since it's just a little more rated amps on this one.

 

Well I just got off the phone with the guy I got the alt from. He said never use a battery that's not speced for the truck even if it is a few cranking amps more because it can mess up your whole charging system and computer?
He also said in a few days if the battery had to make up for the alt not charging it easily could have "fried it"=p

Back to walmart I go..

 

I still don't think the slightly different battery would matter though.. I could see if it were a huge amount less or more but just a few more?


Another thing I just thought about.. When you go from one brand of battery to another for the same vehicle a lot of times there will be even more of a difference in cranking amps.

This one has 900 CA and 770 CCA and looking on autozone's website they have a duralast listed for the 3.0 with 1000 CA and 800 CCA.

Really the biggest difference in this battery from my old one is it's about an inch or inch and a half shorter and actually fits a lot better.

 

so.. anyone ever see anything like that happen to a battery that wasn't the result of being overcharged?

I'm worried when i drop this new one in there the same thing will happen due to the possibility of the alternator being no good..

 

Sure, sounds like maybe the regulator is bad to me. Also check the 3 wire plug, those wires control the regulator and voltage sensor.

I have a real hard time believing its because the battery is slightly different.

 

Thanks for all the help.

I'm going to take it back for them to test before trying it on the new battery.

Seemed like it shouldn't have been overcharging it too much since it did drop down to 13.9 after the truck ran for 5 or 10 min's though.
It was also about 100 degrees outside when it started to bubble up acid after 10 min's of running but that shouldn't matter besides it killin me =p

Well I'm becoming an expert at taking these things out

 

Diffrent battery should not matter, i have a couple hundred CCA diffrence in the battery i have now verse the stock battery and no problems.

I know that when you get smaller batteries like motorcycle and lawn tractor batteries when you first charge them the acid does come out, and it must be normal because it says to just wipe it off as it comes out in the instructions, but i have never seen this with a full auto size battery.

 

Never knew that was normal for smaller batteries.

I found the right battery at another store and I'm getting a replacement alt tomorrow. When he saw how I had to bend the metal cover to get the 3 wire plug to fit in he said we'll just call it defective. Someone had to have dropped it during shipping or something.

I did notice the 3 wire plug has a little bit of white grease (dielectric?) in one of the receptacles but not covering the whole thing.. It's around all of them but just smeared in one.

Tried again to find the negative cable connection... that part where I thought connected to the frame is just a support bracket for the flexible conduit it's in along with the positive cable.
It ends at the starter going in there as one thick wire, nothing else coming out of it at any point before that.

There's already a screw in the side of the engine compartment with a broken off wire very close to the negative cable, so I'll see if I can find any 12 gauge wire laying around to connect it to that.

Thanks again everyone for the input, I'll let you guys know how it all works out::

 

Well So far it's been working alright. When I first started it up it was charging at low 14's and went to upper 13's after running for around 12 min's.

I then turned the lights on and it went down to around 12.8, but this was with the idle at 650 rpm. When I gave it some gas it shot back up to around 14.

Still whenever I'm out places I hold my breath every time I crank it lol.. I'm thinking I should probably adjust that hot idle back up to the 800 rpm it's supposed to be.
The clock display still dims almost completely when I start it but I think that's normal..
The new battery tested at 12.3 before I ever started the truck with it. Haven't tested it since then.

I also got 12 gauge stranded automotive wire from the store with some fork type connectors and ran about a foot and a half of that from the negative battery clamp to the fender.

 

The truck has been sitting for around a week and I drove it a mile down the road, back and then 30 mins later drove about 8 miles... Started right up and I went over to lowes about 2 min's down the road from there.

When I tried to start it up it was dead again... got a jump start and drove home. Tested the battery and it was reading 12.6, tried to start it and it wouldn't. Tested the battery again after trying to crank it a few times.. still 12.6.

I'm stumped.. going to charge it up and check what the alt is putting out but idk anymore

 

Charged it last night and took it to advance auto parts today.. they have a machine to hook up to the battery that displays basically what my volt meter showed along with engine rpm's..

The alt tested good, of course I didn't have the ac or lights on when he tested it. He checked it at idle rpms and then 2000 rpms to see what it put out there.

I did tighten the belt some last night because once the truck warms up it'll intermittently squeak. It didn't do it as much when I drove down there and back, but it still does some.. Can't really tighten it much more though so I think it just needs to be replaced. Even though they only have maybe 7k miles on them they are probably 5 years old.

That would explain why it happens when I go on longer trips on hotter days.. that's when they make the most noise maybe slipping some.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've never found any info on replacing them. Anybody done the 3.0 belts with any pointers I'd appreciate it.