Koronetti70
Active Member
I've been scratching my head working on my friends 1968 Super Bee (Hemi) for a while now.
One day it stopped charging. Turned out one of the "fuse" wires inside the regulator was melted. Put new mechanical regulator in. Worked fine except it was charging +15 Volts. It only measured 11 Volts on the ignition side of the regulator. Of course I then went through the bulkhead connectors with a piece of sandpaper and contact cleaner and tried again.
Worked fine for a couple of seconds and was charging between 13 and 14 Volts until the voltage climbed back to 15 Volts and smoke started coming out of the new regulator. Took the negative cable off immediately. I then opened the regulator but to my surprise there wasn't anything visibly wrong with it.
I also noticed that when the ecu plug is attached, I get only +11 Volts to the "blue" ignition wire side of the regulator. When I unplug the ecu, or unplug the blue wire from the ballast resistor, I get full battery voltage to the ignition side of the regulator.
I believe it has pretty much factory wirings. It has a mechanical voltage regulator. It has new dual field alternator with one of the fields grounded. It also has been converted to Mopar electronic ignition. For some reason it has the dual ballast resistor and wiring for it (the ecu is only 4 pin tho). The regulator seems to have correct resistance on both sides and the wiring on it seems to be in correct order. The ammeter has been bypassed. I made a new charging cable from alternator to battery positive. Also added new ground cable straight from battery to rad frame. I also fixed some other wiring issues while at it.
Everything else seems to be working, lights, wipers etc. I feel like I'm in dead end with this. The right thing to do would be a full new harness but we want to get it running for this summer...
One day it stopped charging. Turned out one of the "fuse" wires inside the regulator was melted. Put new mechanical regulator in. Worked fine except it was charging +15 Volts. It only measured 11 Volts on the ignition side of the regulator. Of course I then went through the bulkhead connectors with a piece of sandpaper and contact cleaner and tried again.
Worked fine for a couple of seconds and was charging between 13 and 14 Volts until the voltage climbed back to 15 Volts and smoke started coming out of the new regulator. Took the negative cable off immediately. I then opened the regulator but to my surprise there wasn't anything visibly wrong with it.
I also noticed that when the ecu plug is attached, I get only +11 Volts to the "blue" ignition wire side of the regulator. When I unplug the ecu, or unplug the blue wire from the ballast resistor, I get full battery voltage to the ignition side of the regulator.
I believe it has pretty much factory wirings. It has a mechanical voltage regulator. It has new dual field alternator with one of the fields grounded. It also has been converted to Mopar electronic ignition. For some reason it has the dual ballast resistor and wiring for it (the ecu is only 4 pin tho). The regulator seems to have correct resistance on both sides and the wiring on it seems to be in correct order. The ammeter has been bypassed. I made a new charging cable from alternator to battery positive. Also added new ground cable straight from battery to rad frame. I also fixed some other wiring issues while at it.
Everything else seems to be working, lights, wipers etc. I feel like I'm in dead end with this. The right thing to do would be a full new harness but we want to get it running for this summer...
