Reoccuring Alternator Failure

  1. #1
    Hello gang,

    I'm a bit stumped by this problem so figure you lot can stretch your brains on this too...

    The car has done 101k and as far as I know is on at least its 5th alternator now - When I bought the vehicle it had a replacement Alt. 12 months ago the alternator gave up, replaced it, then that failed 3 months ago, replaced with another which failed on Thursday.

    Admittedly I knew there was a problem with the most recently failed Alt. since the battery light was on but several tests during the first month confirmed it was charging ok, so I ignored the problem much to my expense.

    Now I've been doing some limited rummaging around the electrics and the Power Feed wrapping from the Alt. had perished a bit somewhat, so I'm wondering if that has come into contact with an earth (can't see how though so I'm guessing it could occur if it was raining) and shorted - would that kill an Alt?

    Could there be any other reason for my car chewing up Alt's?

    Cheers!
  2. #2
    My alternator died as its a VTR alt running a gti engine. But the GTI alt won't go on the car due to the wiring. Cost me a bomb getting recovered and getting new one from garage so i feel you. Is your VTS a conversion job?
  3. #3
    naaa it's a proper one dude. Yeah it's getting expensive now...!