So any ideas as to what alt I may need and where to find it?

 

Are ya blind?

www. PAPerformance.com
Look at the pic below and twice above VERY closely.

[IMG]local://upfiles/69445/C2D890428373407E86CD96B95751B8D2.jpg[/IMG]

 

ok well w/e do what you want to do if you have the money i was trying to save you about $400 but i mean if you just want to buy one more power to you then you know..... i can promise you that you dont need to buy a new one specificaly for a beggining system

 

Do it right or be sorry in a few months.

 

If your battery continues to drain, even after a new one .. its very possible one of the diodes in the alternator has blown which causes a slow leaching of the battery.. so it could still be charging just fine while also leaking power when the car is off.

 

How does an alternaor charge just fine with "leaching" diodes?
Gonna have to do some splaining bout that thought.

Diodes either fail or "blow" open causing diminished amperage output
(there are six of them in an alternator) or fail shorted closed causing
a very bad AC whine, in relation to engine RPM, in the audio system.
They dont fail to a "leach" mode as the above post suggests.
Its an impossability.

 

A diode lets power flow one way and only one way .. Im no expert, but when it happend on my 2000 cavalier a guy who used to rebulild altenators tested mine.. he said he rebuilt alot of older ones and while newer ones were just swapped out that he had seen this problem .. my battery was charging fine and always going dead while sitting.. other systems in the car were checked.. he said it was a diode problem.. I replaced it and sure enough.. no more dead battery while the car sat around..!
It happened on my 2000 cavalier.

So I did a seach on google to find anything that would correlate to my own experience.. found this link: http://www.misterfixit.com/baddiode.htm "10: ..... Bob further explained that one of the Diodes inside the Alternator could be shorted, causing the drain on the Battery, but the Alternator would still put out 12 Volts, and therefor pass the Voltage Output Test, however it could not put out full Current, and would fail the Current Load Test, IF the Shop actually ran that Test. Bob also gave me instructions on measuring the Resistance at the Alternator Connector to determine if the Alternator had this problem.

 

Sorry wrong link for my reference..

HERE IS A WORKING LINK to a man who had the same problem as me

http://www.misterfixit.com/baddiode.htm

Look under #10 .. and at the end the man replaced the altenator and it fixed the battery drain problem.

 

Gotta love the Bob.
If its printed anywhere on the internet,
its the Gods (I mean Bobs) actual truth.
Dont believe what anyone who wants to
sell you anything has to say or half the
mis-information on the internet.
Its all good. Hes got a bad diode and
needs a new alternator like all the other
Forum members who have reported the
- dead battery after sitting a few days -
syndrome. Its a design flaw of the vehicle
and all the key off current drawing devices.
But its all good. A little bad info here or there
never hurt no one.

 

I did more research.

Blown diodes in the Rectifier / voltage regulator ( of an altenator ) do in fact cause a drain of power.
Apparently diodes dont just blow .. they can also fuse and let power go out - when normally they only allow current to flow one direction.

I found many instances of these examples:

http://sg.answers.yahoo.com/question...9072138AAMgsYx

"To test to see if the alternator is slowly failing: With the engine off measure the current flow between the positive battery terminal and postive battery cable. Then disconnect the alternator wiring harness and see if the current draw goes down. The only thing draining the battery with the truck off should be low amp things like the clock, etc. If the alternator is drawing curent then it has a bad diode or something and is draining the battery.

Your alternator has the voltage regulator built in and costs about $90 to replace."