hi all,
I've been having some intermittent odd issues with my p38 (odd eas and clicking relays), which seem to be electrical. This culminated in her loosing all dash output, pulling away oddly and eventually stopping at a junction and refusing to restart. Unfortunately the missus was driving, which didn't go well, thankfully all was ok and the rac diagnosed a bad Altenator.
I'm currently on holiday and about to order some parts for my return, but wanted to canvass for opinion. I've read a few posts on some forums that the symptoms she experienced ( pulling away in wrong gear, loss of rev counter and speedo and traction failure message) are typically Altenator related, but I've not had an Altenator fault message. We've had a flickering battery light on a couple of occasions, but no dash message.
I've tested the Altenator output from the back and it's reading 14v. After sitting for a week the battery is at around 11.5v, so I suspect that definitely needs replacing, but after a run its sat around 13.8. The rac chap hooked up his tester to the battery and read the battery at 11.8v with engine running hence the blaming of the Altenator. He didn't check it At the back. As we were in the middle of a busy junction, I just wanted to get the vehicle moved (I'd arrived at this point).
He hooked up a temp battery pack and I drove home with no issues. Upon arrival I noticed the engine was idling around 1500rpm, which was odd. When he disconnected the battery pack I received all the usual Gearbox Fault messages I'd associate with a bad battery.
I'm happy to replace the Altenator (planning to do this myself), but thought I'd get some opinions before I send out on an alt and battery.
Cheers
Steve
I've been having some intermittent odd issues with my p38 (odd eas and clicking relays), which seem to be electrical. This culminated in her loosing all dash output, pulling away oddly and eventually stopping at a junction and refusing to restart. Unfortunately the missus was driving, which didn't go well, thankfully all was ok and the rac diagnosed a bad Altenator.
I'm currently on holiday and about to order some parts for my return, but wanted to canvass for opinion. I've read a few posts on some forums that the symptoms she experienced ( pulling away in wrong gear, loss of rev counter and speedo and traction failure message) are typically Altenator related, but I've not had an Altenator fault message. We've had a flickering battery light on a couple of occasions, but no dash message.
I've tested the Altenator output from the back and it's reading 14v. After sitting for a week the battery is at around 11.5v, so I suspect that definitely needs replacing, but after a run its sat around 13.8. The rac chap hooked up his tester to the battery and read the battery at 11.8v with engine running hence the blaming of the Altenator. He didn't check it At the back. As we were in the middle of a busy junction, I just wanted to get the vehicle moved (I'd arrived at this point).
He hooked up a temp battery pack and I drove home with no issues. Upon arrival I noticed the engine was idling around 1500rpm, which was odd. When he disconnected the battery pack I received all the usual Gearbox Fault messages I'd associate with a bad battery.
I'm happy to replace the Altenator (planning to do this myself), but thought I'd get some opinions before I send out on an alt and battery.
Cheers
Steve