Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Adventures in Alternators....Pt II

Well I got the new alternator in over the weekend. I figured yesterday evening would be as good a time as any to give installing it a shot. All the mounting hardware match up perfect and all the spacers that came off the old one worked perfect. Everything lined up and bolted up just right. Now the tricky part was making sure I wired it all up right. I guess I got lucky (kind of, had a little help from plenty of TR online forums) because the car started right up and the Ignition light went off, thus showing that the alternator was in fact charging the battery. Victory is mine!!

Finished the alternator off, looked at the clock to realize I still had a bit of the afternoon left to kill. Decided to tackle installing the rear tube shock conversion kit that has been sitting on my workbench for about 6 months. Pretty easy install, conversion brackets mount right up to where the lever shocks where and the new tube shocks went in pretty easy. Had both sides installed in about 45mins and the car back on the ground. Gave the rear end a good shove and what do you know, it didn't bounce. Before switching out the lever shocks the car would bounce up and down about 5 times before stopping!

I plan on giving the TR a little road test this afternoon, I'll report back on the findings tomorrow. Who knows, I may even get a wild hair and actually install the glove box, license plate light, and heater control wire!

Thursday, October 09, 2008

Adventures in Alternators....

Ok, still trying to source an alternator for the TR6. Thought I had one picked out from Advance Auto but it was not to be. The part arrived yesterday. I unpacked it and was curious that the box showed it was a Beck/Arnley alternator, I had ordered a Bosch unit. Pull the alternator out of the box and sure thing, it isn't a Bosch. Sure, the box had the Bosch part number on it, written in sharpie underneath the Beck pn. I paid ~$80 for the Bosch part, figure I would check to see how much this Beck part cost. The Beck part only costs $40! Nice bait and switch there. So this alternator is going back to the store and will be the last time I set foot in an Advance Auto.

I did find a reputable source on ebay (recommended to me by other TR owners) and ordered the replacement Bosch alternator for $60 shipped. Hope to have it soon so I can get the TR back up and running!

I also went ahead and took the plunge to replace the rear shocks. Figured I had the mounting kit for the tube shocks why not go ahead and get it all installed. Order up the shocks from Summit Racing, they should get here early next week. So the plan is to get the alternator in, install the new shocks and install some of the other random new parts I have laying around.

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Blog Life Update...

Just was checking on my site views and stuff. I started this blog Feb. '07. To date it has had 2,100+ visits from 72 countries and territories. Wow. Heck, in the past month things have really picked up, 440+ visits from 44 countries. So, to all the folks that have taken a few minutes out of your life to read my aimless (well sometimes they kind of have a point) ramblings I say thank you!!!

It was the battery.....

Quick note on wife's car. It was the battery, AAA came out and replaced it for her. Must have been a bad cell or something because when I checked it, it showed full voltage. Dunno. The one thing that is complete voodoo to me is electricity. Don't know why, I understand simple circuits and the like but I just don't like dealing with it. New TR alternator is due in next week.