Thread: Replacing the stock generator with an alternator

I would look at fitting lower wattage bulbs to both the main headlights and spots - 55/55 and 55w. Believe it or not, your eyes' response to light is logarithmic. That is, assuming that the 55w lights produce half the brightness of the 100s, the difference in brightness will be just perceptible, not halved. In practice, the difference will be even less, because the voltage drop, even with relays, will be less with the lower current draw.

John

JD, I well remember long night drives with generator equipped vehicles, a lot of them 6 volt, when I lived in Winton long ago. If you had a long drive home at night say from Longreach or Boulia, Kynuna, Muttaburra, you needed to remember to hook up the charger when you got home as particularly with the 6 v. vehicles you might not get a start in the morning. My dad always put a two pin socket somewhere handy on the outside of all the cars and trucks so you drive into the big shed and lift the charger lead off its hook on the wall and plug in. We used to fit 75 watt sealed beams into all the 12 v. vehicles. These were the hot property of the time and long night drives on high beam really tried out those old generator systems. I had an Austin for a while with these installed and two Lucas 7" long range driving lights which I think were 60 watts. Prolonged use of all these used to overtake the generator and after a while I would notice the lights getting progressively dimmer so I would switch off the Lucas pair for a while to let the system catch up.

Brian,
Yes, although I never had enough money to go overboard on lights like that, and the only 6v vehicles I have ever owned were a Model T and a VW (as an aside I find it remarkable that most US vehicles stuck with 6v for decades after most of the rest of the world changed to 12v). When I was working in the Longreach area in the early sixties I had a single Lucas driving light that greatly improved vision, without overloading the generator like two might have. Probably never strictly legal to only have one, but nobody ever queried it!

John

John, I wouldn't have bought them as a single new Lucas Flamethrower was at least a week's pay for an apprentice. I would have been a third year then. I probably got them in exchange for goods or services.

A Delco technical rep. once told me that the Yanks stuck with 6 volts so long because the bulbs are mechanically stronger and Yanks had a lot of bad roads in rural areas particularly in the snow belt where freezing and thawing causes humps and waves and breaks up pavement. Semi trailers on 24 volt prime movers were almost always 12 volt until LED's took over in recent years. Same reason, empty running at night shook the filaments to failure.

Ah ok well it's looks like I fooled the ammeter and myself damn it.

I will have to go down the alternator option then, besides trying to find a series 3 alternator and bracket, can anyone suggest another type, maybe newer one with the regulator onboard??

I have a friend that may be able to get one for me brand new and pretty cheap so a current one would be possible.

Also I heard that the old holden red motor alternator bracket and alternators may do the trick, can anyone confirm this please?

Originally Posted by matpoli

Ah ok well it's looks like I fooled the ammeter and myself damn it.

I will have to go down the alternator option then, besides trying to find a series 3 alternator and bracket, can anyone suggest another type, maybe newer one with the regulator onboard??

I have a friend that may be able to get one for me brand new and pretty cheap so a current one would be possible.

Also I heard that the old holden red motor alternator bracket and alternators may do the trick, can anyone confirm this please?

I found a crowd on eBay that had a 'Lucas equivalent' 70A alternator - regulator built in.

The bottom (hinge) mount was fine but the top sliding mount wasn't too flash - so I used a red Holden alternator mount for that. Worked perfectly.

I changed the fan belt to a Bosch 11A1065 that fitted perfectly and I was up and running.

Mind you, I didn't have to change anything on the firewall mounted voltage regulator as all that had been removed when I rewired the car. If you dig around a bit, you will find a 'mod' that lets you bypass that regulator.

Hey drifter,

When you changed to the alternator did it line up with the fan belt pulley on the engine and did you have to modify the Holden bracket at all?

I found this alternator which is an 85 amp Holden one so I'm hoping it will fit.

CoolDrive - ALT 12V 85A UNIVERSAL BOSCH

Thanks in advance for anymore advice you may have.