Generator there has to be something else?

J

jack leavitt

Junior Member
My generator isnt working i have replaced the brushes, polished the brush holders and replaced the field coils and tested the armature the best i can with a multimeter and cleaned the groves in the commutator the cutout is brand new solid state cutout. Cleaned the ground connections and flashed the fields. Everything says that it should be working but it puts out 0.2 volts when checked with a multimeter. What else could possibly go wrong?
 
It motors in the clockwise direction the best that it ever has. Flashing the fields on the forum here it said to start the car and use a jumper wire to by pass the cut out. No i do not have an original cut out
 
It sounds as though everything is right.
I think the cutout is suspect. I'm not a big fan of those cutouts, I've had too much trouble with them over the years.
There still could be a generator issue, but, I'm inclined to think its OK.

I prefer to clean/adjust an original cutout and install one of Tom W's EVRs. Bulletproof.
 
If the generator is working shouldnt i be able to test it by putting the multimeter to the brass out put on the generator and ground the other lead and get a reading of some sort?

Because on the BAT side of the cut out it shows 6 volts but no amperage and if you go to the other side it shows 0.2 volts and no amps.
When i test the BAT side it is really showing me the battery voltage and amps?
 
It sounds like the generator fields aren't being energized. The .2 volts output is from the residual magnetism.

BTW, it's best to polarize the generator BEFORE you start the engine.

Inspect the field coils to make sure they have a good soldered twisted connection joining them together, and one end well grounded, while the other end goes to the movable brush.
 
What is this hole for?
 

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That is an aftermarket cutout and they added an extra hole for another wire to connect to for certain applications. Just ignore it.

You can lift the adjustable brush off the commutator (or slip paper under it) and connect a 6 volt battery charger - to the brush and + to the generator body. The ammeter on the battery charger should show about 4 amps. Let us know what you read.
 
Tom Wesenberg said:
That is an aftermarket cutout and they added an extra hole for another wire to connect to for certain applications. Just ignore it.

You can lift the adjustable brush off the commutator (or slip paper under it) and connect a 6 volt battery charger - to the brush and + to the generator body. The ammeter on the battery charger should show about 4 amps. Let us know what you read.
Click to expand...

jack leavitt said:
I do not have an ampmeter on my battery charger but i did the test and the ampmeter in the car showed nothing
Click to expand...

What this test does, is a basic test of the field coils. The charger supplies power to the third brush (that is now insulated from the armature) flows through the coils and ends up on the body and back to the charger. The electrical flow should be 4 amps if the coils and connections are good. the ammeter in the car cannot be used for this test.
 
jack leavitt said:
What if the field coils were reversed ? would that cause all this trouble?
Click to expand...

If the fields are in backwards, then the generator will spin the OPPOSITE direction that it normally turns.

Everyone should own a 4 to 6 amp battery charger with an amp meter. Then you know exactly what's happening while charging the battery and you can use it for testing things. I keep a few around and bought them all for under $10 at swap meets and pawn shops.
 
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