Electric problem? Normal?

[Joker96]

Yhe issue i am having is that car runs fine but when cooling fans activate rpms kinda drop 100-200 rpms and car becomes like heavy what i mean is i need o push the pedal further for it to keep accelerating and at night lights dim and the same happens. Is this normal? I dont remember noticing this so badly. Battery?

[4-G-rim]

Sounds like the alternator.

Fans kick on...extra electrical load, and symptoms you explaining can happen.

How old is your battery?

[galantlvr34]

yeah it deffinantly sounds like the battery or alternator is on the way out.autozone can test it for you.

[Joker96]

Id say alt was replaced almost 5 yrs ago and 1 and half the car was off bat is like 4 months old

[galantlvr34]

do you have a volt meter?if you do try it with the car running and try it with the car off and see what the volts are.autozone can do a load test and tell you if the alternator is bad.

[Joker96]

Ill take the car to auto zone to get it checked then

[galantlvr34]

ok let us know what they say when you find out the results of the test.

[Joker96]

Can i get a stronger alternator?? Stronger than stock?

[galantlvr34]

yeah i believe you can get a 110 amp alternator.do you have a sound system in your car?

[Joker96]

Not yet but i plan to. I am also getting hid's soon so am just making sure i fix everything electrical before i do that. Not even my horn sounds i took the car to a electromecanc an the guy said there where a lot of useless cables in the fuse box and started cutting cables the horn never sounded again....

[galantlvr34]

Not yet but i plan to. I am also getting hid's soon so am just making sure i fix everything electrical before i do that. Not even my horn sounds i took the car to a electromecanc an the guy said there where a lot of useless cables in the fuse box and started cutting cables the horn never sounded again....

that doesnt sound to good hopefully he didnt cut anything important and that is the reason you are having these problems now.

[DOHCstunr]

Your fans and many other accessories like headlights and rear defroster are always going to cause a momentary drop in rpm. Its because of increased load on the alternator and the lag between when you switch something on and the voltage regulator in the alternator adjusting output.


On a side note, the best thing you can do for your car is clean up all of your grounds. Sand/polish all of your ground terminals(every single one you can find on the firewall, tranny, exhaust, inside the car, even the ecu grounds)
and I highly reccomend cutting back your battery power and ground cables about an inch and installing new high quality gold plated terminals.
Also, behind the battery under the fuse box and on the engine bay side of the fenderwell the battery negative has a chassis ground terminal. polish that bad boy up, and sand the paint down thats underneath it until bare metal is exposed(but only the area that will be covered back up by the terminal) then resecure it.

Our cars are old, the grounds are corroded and oxidized(all of them) and a little TLC will go a LOOOOOOoooong way.

For me? After I did the above procedure, my power windows are now the fastest they have ever been(like brand new showroom fast), my starter cranks like its on speed, and even my blower fan for the heater/air conditioning blows hard like it used to.

Its love.

[Joker96]

Sounds great but i have very minimal mechanical knowledge all ive done in ny car is with a tutorial. I can get some 60 grit sanding paper and sand the battery cablesnand cut a bit off the positve terminal. I recently replaced my terminals but where are the ecu grounds or the firewall tranny grounds? I saw in ebay some voltage regulating thing and also some ground cables.

[Joker96]

ok so i asked my mechanic, he knows a lot bout dsm? eclipse tuning and stuff he had a few of em and he told me where the grounds where and also told me that i could get a smaller pulley for the alt and a shorter belt and it would make the alt spin faster giving more current or we. is that safe?

[SiônRo88]

Did you get a new battery? I was having trouble when I turned on my AC, the RPMs would drop, a little more than what you described though, my cluster lights were dim as well. Shortly after this happened my battery died, I put a brand new one in and problem solved. Its normal to experience an RPM drop when you flip your AC on but that dimming isn't right.

[RacerX4g64S]

Alternator don't put out max amps until 1800-2500 rpm. I thought about installing a smaller pulley but never found one to work.

Also since the bearing would be spinning faster it may ware out sooner. Plus it will put a larger load on the belt.

[Gt_Galant]

Alternator don't put out max amps until 1800-2500 rpm. I thought about installing a smaller pulley but never found one to work.

Also since the bearing would be spinning faster it may ware out sooner. Plus it will put a larger load on the belt.


Thats true, my opinion, get the alt tested and if its that 100% change it to a standard one and maybe change the battery as a faulty alt drains the battery.

And the hids should be okay, and with a sound system install a 2farad capacitor (or larger/smaller depends on the wattage system all up) to help with the power levels of the system or if your going big power a second battery maybe .