Charging Issues,

[RocketeerSr]

I have a 63 Dart that seems to have a charging issue. When driving down the freeway or other higher RPM's situations, my charging gauge in the dash is pegged all the way to the right. We tested in the shop and it is getting 17volts. I put in a new voltage regulator yesterday and no change. Any thoughts? Thanx

 

[BillGrissom]

Asked regularly. Many simple tests you can run (search). It is a very simple circuit. 12 V on the single field terminal will command "full output". Find which component isn't doing its job, using a multimeter and jumper wires, and could be as simple as a bad ground (very common - from ALT case to BATT- or from Vreg case to BATT-). The bulkhead connector often gets melted, but less likely on a 1963 since yours has dedicated lugs to feed the big ALT and BATT wires thru.

 

[nm9stheham]

Does this '63 Dart have the original wiring and charging system? If you do not know, please post some pix of the regulator and the back of the alternator.

If this is charging that hard and is the original '63 system, it likely has a bad/wrong regulator or is miswired. There is a blue wire that carries 12v to the regulator. If all is well, at fast idle, a low voltage of a few volts will be measured out of the other regulator terminal onto the green wire that goes to the single field wire to the back of the alternator. Check the voltage on this green wire: anything near to 12v on this on the original '63 system will cause the alternator to produce an overcharge.

If you have a later alternator system, then we need to know as it will behave differently.