I edited a bit my previous post.
hey, I'm agree ppl can like or not the ammeter and everybody decide his own route, but everytime I post about this, is just cleaning the concepts. Lot of ppl take their decisions under a wrong concepts they read around without wonder theirself how the system works and what it was the real culprit. That's all. There is lot of ignorance on this topic.
The ammeter is unsafe under an unsafe enviroment, just like is unsafe a gas line at a side of the coil, if gas line gets a leak, or coil wire gets an arch due broken isolation. And both live side by side into engine bay. If you don't keep safe those items, engine bay will get fire, just like the ammeter will get a short on a cracked isolation for whatever reason.
You can burnt your gauges if the voltage limiter gets somehow ungrounded. Just a few ppl knows about this, but.... is voltage limiter fault ? no! just that it is on that way! Now we have electronic replacements what can save this, but back in the days, that it was the technology available! You have the upgrade option now and no need to fit an autometer setup on your cluster! or simply clean and tight everything, make the mantenience to keep the stock voltage limiter still safe. So It could be a Voltage limiter fault ? no! is another fail what could made the voltage limiter get ungrounded untill burn the gauges! AND THE VOLTAGE LIMITER CAN BE STILL IN WORKING ORDER
You can get a big short too if the ignition switch wire gets peeled off and gets grounded.
Those were couple of examples where another kind fails can get some pieces fail without fail by itself and still be in perfect conditions!!!
now, what it was the reason the ammeter isolation got cracked and missed a section ? a good question to be answered!
what kind of readings the ammeter was getting all these years ? it was overlooked or taken seriouslly ? if the owner ( being the OP or not ) doesn't know what it means the ammeter reading, will blame everything but the correct piece or part of the game to blame.
So stop the ampophobia ( damn I really liked that LOL ) and learnt about this. Fear is beated with knowledgement. This kind of threads without the correct information just increase the "ampophobia" without need for that.
So I would say IF YOU GET THIS FAIL, IS TIME TO CHECK WHY IT HAPPENED!, not really THE REASON WHY BYPASS THE AMMETER.... because even bypassing the ammeter, the alt can be still not sourcing enough your car and batt, so will get another fail somewhere sooner or later for the same reason the ammeter "got failed" ( actually the assembly, but not the gauge itself )! You are not fixing the main problem, just the failed item due the main problem!
That's all.
). At any rate, right or wrong, I felt it easier and safer to simply bypass the thing and rely on the volt meter.
