I ordered a 140A alt from Mr. Alternator this summer, and found out it wasn't charging but 70A. I emailed Tom (Mr. Alternator) and told him of the problem. A week and a half later, I have another 140A alt on my doorstep... no questions asked. Now all I have to do is switch them out and send the other alt back, shipping paid. Definitely an awesome guy to work with. All I'm hoping for now is that the new alt work like it's supposed to.

I noticed that both alts he sent me were NipponDenso units. I thought that ND's couldn't be re-wound to put out more current? I will probably take the new one to get bench tested before I put it on. It's gonna suck if it doesn't because Tom is a good guy who seems to stand behind his work. We'll just have to see.

 

Damn - I guess I better get mine tested now...

 

70A at what RPMS? If that's at idle, then you might want to loadtest it again at a higher speed to make sure, say 2-2.5k RPMS. The slower it's spinning the less energy it can put out, and at idle speeds it won't be able to meet that spec.

 

I asked my local guy to test mine the other day, but he misunderstood what I was looking for and just tested voltage. (ugh)

I'll actually be back over there next week and I'll have it done then.

 

Sorry, I should have included that. It was tested for 70A @ 2000 RPMS... no load.

 

Ya, I have been in touch with him too, and he seems like a great guy. I mean, he is from South Carolina after all!

 

What did it cost?

Is it straight bolt-in?

What year and engine?

Thanks.

 

I got mine for 220

It's a straight bold on

1994 3VZE

 

I think mine was $235 including shipping; Straight bolt-in, very easy to do (once I found the hidden tensioner bolt!); and mine's a '96 3.4L.

 

Thanks Churnd. This is the first that I had heard of a no modification bolt-in replacement.

 

No problem. If you're thinking about picking one up, you might wanna wait until I get the one I just got bench tested to see if it's actually putting out more charge. I'm getting it tested either tonite or tomorrow morning, as I want to put it on tomorrow sometime. I'll post the results.

 

Ohhhhhhhhhh-kayyyyyyyyy

So, I needed to get the new alternator tested before I installed it, right? To do that, I decided to take it to one of the Advance Auto Parts (a.k.a. high school dropout heaven) stores in my area, since they'll do it for free. So I get there and plunk the alt down on the testing bench and politely wait for somebody to come over and help. I wait for 15 mins and nobody comes to help, but every employee in the store has seen me standing there. So I finally go up to one of them and ask to get my alt checked. He replies, "Oh ok, I'll be there in a sec." He goes over and talks to his manager for a "sec".

5 mins later he comes back and informs me that he's never tested an alternator before, but he knows how to do it since he's done a few starters. "Ok.", says I. He proceeds to fumble around with the machine, while mumbling things that sounded an awful lot like "I think this goes.... yeah... hmm... wha... shhhhii... mm hmm." He finally found the right plug he was looking for to work with the machine and my alt. He plugged it in, mounted the alt, ran the belt from the pulley to the machine, and fired it up. (Ka-pwing!!!)... the belt shoots across the store because he didn't have it on right. I'm standing there, my eyes as wide as can be, in pure amazement. "Haw, man... I ain't never seen that happen before!", as he clomps over to the belt to pick it up. This happened 3 more times... only because I let it. Finally, the manager came over and says, "What the hell are you doin shootin that belt across the sto' fo', stupid?!? Ahhh, man... move ova and let me do it!!" He runs the belt properly and goes back to his counter. "Dude, I don't know what his problem is.", the idiot says. "Uh-huh.", I replied. So now we have the alt wired up, hooked up, and belted up... so he flicks the switch once again and the machine runs. But nothing comes up on the readings. "That thang should be comin' up by now.", Idiot says. I pointed out that the output post was grounded against the mounting hardware of the machine. "That don't make no difference.", he said. "You wanna bet?", I said. "I think I know what I'm doin'.", he said. "The hell you do.", I said, as I took my alt and left.

Next store I went to, O'Reilly's, had much more competent employees. The guy there hooked it up right the first time, but the machine couldn't get a fixed reading. "This guage says it's charging fine but that light's supposed to have gone off by now.", he said. He ran the test 3 times to make sure, and each time came out the same. The guy said he had never seen that happen before. I don't know if it had to do with the fact that the alt was re-wound or what.

Regardless of my unfortunate testing experiences, I decided to install the alt anyway. 30 mins later, I fired the truck up and went for a test drive. It is charging better than the one I had on before. Is it putting out the 140A that Tom (Mr. Alternator) claims it can? I don't know. I don't think I'll ever know. I'm just glad that at a complete stop I can have my headlights on and hit the brakes at the same time and not watch the voltmeter drop down 2 volts. I think I'll just run this one until it dies, then do more research on a different alternator that was made stock to put out whatever current it puts out. If I come across something before then that looks promising enough, I'll jump on it. Maybe one of you guys out there who can weld might be willing to make a bracket extension for the MR2 alt? Hmm... something to think about for the future.

 

I never did post why I thought the first alt started messing up. I'm not 100% sure, but I think it had to do with running the extra 8 guage cable from the charging post straight to the battery, as I mentioned in this thread. The other alt ran fine until I hooked up the extra wire. Once I did, I immediately noticed a lack of power for a brief time. Then whatever lost power seemed to correct itself, but the battery wasn't charging nearly as well as it was before I added the wire.

I removed the wire, and things got a little better... but still not as good as it was before. I'm aware that the stock wiring passes through a fusable link, but I didn't see any harm in bypassing the link. I guess I was wrong, and my alt paid for it. I'm assuming that I had diode failure or something concerned with the regulator.