Quote:
Originally posted by a69vette
Question: Was your alt. making any noise before you decided to rebuild? I thought I had a loose belt, but it appears that the sound is coming from the alt. Does this mean a bearing going bad? Could you please describe the rebuild process in a little more detail?
Thanks,
Rick |
Rick: No, my alternator wasn't making any noise that I could tell. I just figured it was in need of some attention since a typical alternator seems to last 60,000 + miles or so and my car is at around 81,000.
If your hearing some noise at your alternator, I would hazard to guess that at least your bearings are dry. Just like wheel bearings, if not regreased they'll make noise & eventually fail.
The rebuild is quite simple (at least I thought it was). The rebuild alternator kit and bearing kit both came with instruction sheets outlining the process. Just basic tools are needed, along with oil degreaser & electrical parts cleaner. A bench vise, and metal cleaner and/or a wire brush.
Here are some of the very basic rebuild steps:
1). Disconnect battery and remove alternator from car.
2). On lower side, out of sight, score alt. case with line (for re-assembly purposes)
3). If alt. original, most likely only 4 screws hold it together. Remove them & seperate halves. Provided rebuild instructions are now followed (only four replacement parts were in my rebuild kit. Bearing kit is seperate w/two bearings).
4). With case seperated you can see the rear bearing and see how bad or good it is. (I'd replace both bearings regardless anyway)
5). Front bearing is under the rotating assembly and this is where the vise comes in since you have to clamp the assembly tight so the front securing nut can be loosened.
IMPORTANT!! - DO NOT clamp metal rotating assembly with the metal vise without protecting the metal rotating assembly. I cut a section of a old rubber serpentine belt that came off of my Jeep Cherokee that worked great for that.
6). The nut holding the alt. fan is removed which frees the front case from the rotating assembly. This is where the front bearing is located on the underside of the case. There's a cover plate w/3 screws holding it on, remove the screws and the bearing is exposed. The bearings are gently (don't want to damage the case) tapped/knocked out & the new ones tapped into place (I added additional grease under the front securing cover and inside the rear bearing itself).
7). Once the case and other related parts are cleaned, the alt. is re-assembled (this is where the line marks on the case come into play) then re-installed onto the car.
Like a I said at the beginning, this is just a basic outline. The instructions spell it out quite well (mine also had diagrams). There were not a lot of parts & pieces to worry about. I spent more time cleaning the darned thing of grease and grime than I did in the actual rebuild of the alt. itself. The cleaning was both inside and outside the case, with a lot of it being inside the case!
Hope this helps.
Steve
Art
Alternator Rebuild - Something 4 U to consider? 
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