carman85

ok i just got a cheep amp gauge and i need to know were to hook the power wire too so i can see how many amps i have when driveing

7upedition

hook to the alternator

7upedition

For a volt meter you go in line from the alternator to the battery, for the amp meter you should be able to do the same, i believe the third wire from the alternator goes to the dash guage for volts. (1 wire for ground, 1 for return to battery and i think one to dash for guage) Why are you interested in Amps rather than volts? You can get a load tester to check if the alternator is charging properly. The alternator should be producing 13-14volts. Do you still have the stock 75-85Amp alternator or upgraged to a 3g 135 amp? Give me as may details as you can as to what and why your doing this so i can help better...k

luckythirteen13

he might be interested in amps if he is running a lot of electrical equipment in the car......fog lights, head lights, huge sterio, a/c, dare i say....neon lights lol and wants to check the amps being drawn at any given time. its not good to run an alt at full capacity

7upedition

my bud jeff forwarded this article to me, it makes sense and will answer a lot of questions you may have:

http://www.autometer.com/tech_faq_an...px?sid=1&qid=5

But i still dont see the need to run an amp guage, a voltage guage will be enough to indicate if the system is drawing more current than the alternator can support, hence the battery voltage guage will be drawn down, or you can calculate the draw from your accessories and determine if you have suffucient power to supply all of those.

7upedition

My gears are grinding on this one, does anyone else have any experience with running an amp guage on a 5.0 motor? give some details if you do, i just wanna know for general knowledge.