Hoping someone can advise on this - driving my classic today, 2 years after rebuild including complete rewire and has done 4,000 miles with no trouble. The car has a typical sixties oil-filled coil, distributor, points replaced with aftermarket module, new AGM battery, new leads everywhere etc. No ECUs or computers in sight.
Today, with no warning the engine stopped instantly, as if the key had been turned off, and the ignition warning light came on. I managed to pull over somewhere safe, turned the key off and back on and it fired up and I continued. 2-3 minutes later, it did it again. This time I had a look but couldn't see a problem. The king lead, HT from coil to centre of distributor cap, is not a great fit so I pulled it out and carefully refitted it properly. I then drove home, 120 miles, with no problem. However once going again, I noticed that the ammeter (yes, it's early sixties) was now showing +15A once the engine was above idle for the whole journey. If left to idle it dropped to -15A. Prior to the stopping incident, it pretty much stayed at zero all the time except for immediately after starting for a short while.
Can anyone suggest what I should check? The dynamo has been replaced by a Dynator, which is an alternator that looks like a dynamo. Do I now have a damaged alternator, or maybe a failed battery (Exide AGM, much less risk of corrosion to the battery mountings)? I'm pretty sure it shouldn't be showing 15A charge all the time I'm running above idle.
As you can tell, my knowledge of electrics is close to zero so any help would be very much appreciated!
Thanks,
Roger
Today, with no warning the engine stopped instantly, as if the key had been turned off, and the ignition warning light came on. I managed to pull over somewhere safe, turned the key off and back on and it fired up and I continued. 2-3 minutes later, it did it again. This time I had a look but couldn't see a problem. The king lead, HT from coil to centre of distributor cap, is not a great fit so I pulled it out and carefully refitted it properly. I then drove home, 120 miles, with no problem. However once going again, I noticed that the ammeter (yes, it's early sixties) was now showing +15A once the engine was above idle for the whole journey. If left to idle it dropped to -15A. Prior to the stopping incident, it pretty much stayed at zero all the time except for immediately after starting for a short while.
Can anyone suggest what I should check? The dynamo has been replaced by a Dynator, which is an alternator that looks like a dynamo. Do I now have a damaged alternator, or maybe a failed battery (Exide AGM, much less risk of corrosion to the battery mountings)? I'm pretty sure it shouldn't be showing 15A charge all the time I'm running above idle.
As you can tell, my knowledge of electrics is close to zero so any help would be very much appreciated!
Thanks,
Roger