not far at all. if u dont stop, ull be ok. once u stop, the car is gonna die. i know from experience. lol. i was driving on the interstate and all of a sudden i lost everything. dash needles went to 0, stereo shut off, no lights, but the car was still moving. as soon as u stop, the car is gonna die.

 

Really, I could be wrong, but 5 miles doesn't sound too far off. The Focus alternator is a notoriously low output as it is, I just don't see it holding up for very long. I mean how long could You live without a brain...?

Of course , this is just conjecture, as I really have no clue. I try to make sure both battery and alternator are in good working order, if I can help it.

 

The Focus alternator is a notoriously low output as it is

105 amps is low output??? [8]

 

That depends on how good and large the capacity is on the battery. The first thing you should do when the battery light comes on, and you know the belt is broken- or alternator is bad- is turn off everything electrical that you can. No radio, dim the interior lights, turn the blower/AC off and anything that you can do to lighten the load.

Now, if your belt is broken, and you have a Duratec, you're not going to be going very far anyway because your engine will shortly overheat unless it's very cold outside. I'm not sure if Zetecs have externally driven water pumps or not.

How far can you go? Maybe further than you think- especially if it's daytime like the OP asked. I doubt it would go much further than 20-30 miles though. EFI uses a lot of electrical energy.

I drove my old Aerostar all the way to my friend's junkyard which is about 40 miles away. Halfway there, it died, and I had to get a jump. We charged the battery for 30 minutes with another vehicle, and I was able to make it the rest of the way. That was when I learned that cops won't jump your vehicle any more- but they will help you push it off the side of the road.

 

When all of the lights in My SE would flicker at night, when no other car I have EVER driven or owned would do that(unless the alternator was crapping out, classic symptom), with a new alternator, I work under the impression that yes it is a low output alternator.

Apparently Im just a retard, though.

F it, chances are You're probably right...and as it turns out, that comment of Mine was irrelevant anyhow, the OP was more interested in the battery life.

 

the lights flickering is a diffrent issure. noone called anyone a retard... anyways when mine crapped out i unhooked the drl's and i drove 137 km's (85 miles) on the highway and some country roads on a used battery. once the gauges go out you are screwed no matter if you try to keep driving or stop the engine will stop..cant suck its own fuel lol volt gauge ftw lol

 

Mine lasted about 70 miles or so I'd say. I drove home from NOPI Nationals, Atlanta to Auburn, using 2 batteries (1 from a Duratec... don't ask lol). But it's about 120 miles + more getting on the interstate and the 2nd battery died pretty much just as I pulled into my parking space at my apartment, the gauges dies right when I got off the interstate and I made it probably about another half-mile back to my apt.

 

how much is an alt in the states? here in canada the dealer wanted between 5 and 6 uninstalled and a reman was 4 somthing

 

I got one on here for 40 or 50 bucks... Still sitting on the shelf, mine hasnt died yet.

 

" I'm thinking it would be a lot further than that as I had a similar thing happen to me a few years back when renting a large Ryder truck for an in town move. The last load of the day, 8:00pm at night, the truck died in city traffic. Ryder came out with a fully charged battery - installed it and we drove nearly 25 miles with headlights on to Ryder's repair facility. Never hesitated."


im thinking this truck was a diesel? if it was these engines will run a LONG time without a battery as long as you keep them turned on they dont need spark or anything and if it has a mech fuel pump it will go forever lol tried and true lol

 

75 - 80 miles sounds pretty good. If your alternator crapped out it might be cheaper to buy a battery and charge the one in the car to get home, depending on the distance, and then install the spare alternator once you got the car home. Might save a tow charge if your stuck on the side of a highway.

When I was looking for the regulator assembly for my spare alternator, FORD doesn't sell them but they want between $275 and $425 for for the alternator alone. Funny thing is the parts guy didn't know why the price difference - I asked if one was new and the other remanufactured - he didn't know!?

Any way I read somewhere that the average life of our alternators is around 120K miles before the brushes wear out. I pulled a few alternators apart at the salvage yard that had just over 100k miles and the brushes (two brushes) never seem to wear evenly together. One seems to be a lot shorter than the other - even though they start out at the same length. Spring tension I guess.

So if only one brush is making contact would that be just a half wave rectifier instead of two brushes and a full wave rectifier? Somewhat of and early warning that your alternator is going out? I've never seen the wiring diagram of an alternator.

I'm pretty sure the Ryder was non-diesel, more than 10 years ago. But it did have a bad alternator per the service guy.

 

The brushes are for the rotor and are supplied varying DC voltage to modify the magnet field in the rotor to vary the voltage output of the alternator.

So one brush is positive and the other negative.

I've seen the wear difference in alternator brushes, starter brushes, and solenoid contacts. I forget which is which, but when you have 2 contacts (one which is positive, the other negative) one of them wears more (it's either the one that's negative or the one that's positive)

 

You guys are making me want to pull my alternator and check it out.

 

Just disconnect the power wire from it and bring a spare battery. [wave]

 

I made it about 25-30 miles in a focus. The battery light came on & it was one of those either try it or get it towed situations. I was suprised how far I made it. I figured if anything the tow would be cheaper since they charge by the mile.

Kept the radio off no lights was really easy on the car. It wasn't till about 20 miles that the cluster shut down and the car still ran but started to run funny. The last 5 or so miles were me expecting it to die completely any second, but sure enough it made it.

 

i think ill just rebuild my spare and throw it in there lol

 

this would be a fun test. next test.... alt only no battery.

 

wont that fry the computer? myth? i wouldent do it. but thats just me

 

There's a problem with some of these stories.....you don't know the capacity of the battery or it's state of charge when the alternator failed. If the alternator output was weak for a long time before it failed, the car may not go very far. If you have a fully charged high capacity battery, you could drive a hundred miles at least in the day-time, on the battery alone.

Disconnect the daytime headlights, the brake lights, and all the accessories......drive slowly enough so the radiator fans don't come on. To save money......find a place that sells batteries and buy a few that are fully charged. You could conceivably drive a long way in the daytime, and rent a cheap motel room to charge all the batteries over-night.

Tow bills can be very high, as could having some road-side repair place change the alternator....they always rip you off.

 

Hmmm… something like this happened to me… well not really.

I had a loose connection with my positive terminal on the battery. I knew this but never thought twice about it. I the wife and family (in a separate car) were on our way down Boston, to eat at the Cheese cake Factory. I made it down to Boston but in the heavy Sunday traffic my car died. It ended up being that same loose Connection to the positive terminal. Well I went over 100 miles …. It’s about 85ish if I stayed on i-95 but I hit i-495 to a friend first and then i-93. Then there was the trip back home that included jump starts several times.


Well thinking again, my situation doesn’t really fall into the scenario because I believe my Alternator was still working but I have to say, that Sunday was 1 HELL OF A NIGHT/TRIP!



-TOe



P.s. i lost both my HID in the process... still not working.

 

Just to add that if your driving a 1990 odd vehicle your alternator rotor ( electric magnets ) will draw current , so the sad thing is that this "option" to get home safely is non existent for by switching that OFF you will take the alternator out of the circuit together with the regulator internal 3 PIN connector. LED lights help a lot and finally complete radio switch as some of these ALSO draw current on the sly. I estimate most likely 200 km + if your battery is good and big ( yet to see a Lithium config ). Ultimately a brush-less fan motor with PWM to run for cooling - i have not got a good price YET for this project. Alternators from the passed replaced with Li-ion .

 

My 06 alternator died and I have a 6 month old battery. While I was waiting for a rebuild, I found with a fully charged battery(smart charger overnight) it would go from 12.6v running leaving my driveway to 11.8v after 40 minutes of highway driving to work with no radio/fan/headlights, I'd recharge during the day and do the same drive home. From previous experience I've found my car would run down to about 10.5v reliably before cutting out occasionally. So probably I could go a max 60 min in a stretch with a fully charged battery to start?

 

You are asking for it, I've seen the fuel pump slow down to drop pressure at 12 volts even before and car died. So much depends on what kind of shape your electrical overall is in. The computer can commonly post fake codes at 11.5 showing it is not working right.