Series 3 alternator help

[madp]

Hi all,
I am new to rovers, I just purchased a 73 Series 3 109 SW RHD 2.25 petrol fresh of the boat from England. I am having a great time getting to know the Landy, but I am looking for some help with the alternator. It seems that the alternator is not hooked up to anything (which explains why the battery kept on dying….). I need to get this thing charging and on the cheap, so I was hoping someone could explain what wires go where, it has the standard Lucas alternator, which has the 3 spades on it and I gather from trying to decipher the Circuit diagram that 2 of the wires connect up to the starter solenoid and one goes off else where. What sized wires do I need to use and what spades of to what on the solenoid and else where? Also does there need to be an earth connection coming from the alternator? I greatly appreciate your time and assistance of this.
--James

[leafsprung]

Might be a good idea to determine if the alternator is functioning or if there is a short. It was likely disconnected for a reason. The Lucas 16 ACR has 3 wires. 2 browns are connected to the positive side of the battery via the starter solenoid. The third brown and yellow wire is connected to the sense/warning lamp circuit.

[friar mike]

Might be a good idea to determine if the alternator is functioning or if there is a short. It was likely disconnected for a reason. The Lucas 16 ACR has 3 wires. 2 browns are connected to the positive side of the battery via the starter solenoid. The third brown and yellow wire is connected to the sense/warning lamp circuit. If your wire's are lose and not in a plastic wire holder this may help.
The 2 big blades on that alternator are not the same. I use to think thay were most books say thay are both + and thay are but thay work differently. I went thought this on a TR6 and sent one alt back becouse of no output and I talked to guys who have been working on english rides longer then me would have bet good money that thay are the same! come to find out not true. If you have a setup that has only one big brown wire it gos in a middle blade( thats the one between the end big blade and the small blade) I found a book that showed me there is a differents. hopefuly this will save you time and aggravation.

[leafsprung]

The left most is sense wire, the middle is charge and the right one is the "ind" or warning lamp circuit. They may or may not be marked as such on the alt. I donno what Friar Mike is talking about, maybe he can elaborate.

[madp]

Thanks for the suggestions, it for what you guys have said it looks pretty strait forward.
I took a picture of the solenoid so hopefully Friar Mike you can point out what spaid to use. The big terminal on the right is where the Battery connects and the one to the left goes to the starter.
Is there an easy way to see if the Alternator is working by using a volt meter?
Once again thanks for your help!

[leafsprung]

You might need to trace some wires as it looks like the wires that would be going to the alternator are connected to the solenoid. In the factory wiring arrangement, there are 4 wires attached to the solenoid besides the cables going to the starter and battery. The small switched terminal has a white/red wire going to the ignition switch. The hot terminals have three brown wires. One going to junction which powers the inspection sockets/light switch/unswitched side of the fuse block. The remaining two are the sense and charge circuits for the alternator. The charge circuit is normally the larger of the two. So figure out whats wires are currently hooked to it and where they go. This should allow you to sort things out. One thing thats important is that the warning lamp is wired in series so if the bulb goes out it can keep the alternator from charging exept at high RPMs. Do a google search or check the shop manual for alternator testing proceedures. You can also take them to various auto parts stores and have them tested.

[friar mike]

The left most is sense wire, the middle is charge and the right one is the "ind" or warning lamp circuit. They may or may not be marked as such on the alt. I donno what Friar Mike is talking about, maybe he can elaborate.
What I ran into was the car had a plastic plug with the wires in it there were only 2 on this car one big brown wire one small brown with yellow stripe (the same way my SIII is) . someone had moved the big one to the outside blade and it didn't work. it took a while to find a manual that showed where it went. most of my manuals just show the wires going to the alt not the placement of them. I used my rover manual to get it right on the TR6. Funny all of my manuals are factory ones and the TR6 one didn't show this. on earlyer brit cars I mostly see all three wires blades being used and the 2 big wires are brown but having someone mess with the placement can make my job a little harder. just something to check for if someone has been messing about it make something simple turn into a job and the alt was not marked.

[friar mike]

Thanks for the suggestions, it for what you guys have said it looks pretty strait forward.
I took a picture of the solenoid so hopefully Friar Mike you can point out what spaid to use. The big terminal on the right is where the Battery connects and the one to the left goes to the starter.
Is there an easy way to see if the Alternator is working by using a volt meter?
Once again thanks for your help!
yep just use a volt meter it will tell you all you need to know.

[leafsprung]

I mostly see all three wires blades being used and the 2 big wires are brown but having someone mess with the placement can make my job a little harder. just something to check for if someone has been messing about it make something simple turn into a job and the alt was not marked.

It will still work if the two brown wires are swapped as they are both connected to the same point (electrically), but not if the warning lamp circuit is swapped with the charge circuit like yours was. I doubt anyone working on any kind of cars, never mind british cars would tell you differently.

[friar mike]

It will still work if the two brown wires are swapped as they are both connected to the same point (electrically), but not if the warning lamp circuit is swapped with the charge circuit like yours was. I doubt anyone working on any kind of cars, never mind british cars would tell you differently.
This TR6 and my SIII only has one big brown wire so it has to be in the middle one to charge. I never said the warning light (small b/y wire) were swapped I should have said "between the 2 big blade's and having only one big brown wire it was placed one the wrong blade" I sometimes have a hard time typing what I mean to say. I didn't mean to cause more confusion then help.

[gobie desert]

question for you series alt guys, i have a series III stage 1, i am doing the delco alt conversion. my lucas 18acr has 4 pins in the back. 3 are lined up and one is off to the side. the 3 lined up are two big spade connectors and one smaller one at bottom. into each large connector goes a heavy brown wire and a brown wire out to a relay mounted on the side of the inner fender, into the small connector goes the bronw/yellow (warning light), then a small brown wire connects to a seperate smaller pin off to the side. so in total i have 4 wires going into my alt. 2 big brown, one brown/yellow and one smaller brown.

and into delco i have 3 connectors.
numbers 1, 2 pins then the bat post.
so my question is what?????????
where do i start?
i know brown/yellow goes to number 1 post
do both heavy brown wires go to bat post?
why do i have 2 heavy brown wires?
what is the smaller brown wire for? and where does that go?
i curse you mr. lucas...
help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
-hawk

[scott]

i just replaced a lucas 43 amp with a delco 65 amp. the lucas had the 3 spades but i only had 2 wires. big to the starter relay bolted to the battery post the smaller to an amp gauge. on my delco i jumped the bat post to the spade that connected the big (ran a new 10 gauge) wire to the strater relay and the little still goes to my amp gauge

[greenmeanie]

Good reading for Delco alternators. All will become clear.

http://www.madelectrical.com/electrical-tech.shtml

Cheers
Gregor

[gobie desert]

okay but that doesn't tell me what to do with all my wires. does anybody know?

i have 4 wires and 3 spots on the delco.

:mad:

[greenmeanie]

More,
In this case Bosch = Lucas 18ACR
http://www.cibolas7.net/17901.html

There's tons of other pages out there if you start looking around the classic british car pages.

Summary
Two large browns are battery output.
Brown/yellow is the charge indicator.
Brown is sense.

This site is useful in explaining the LUCAS wire colour codes.
http://muddyoval.com/articles/generalinfo/wiringid.htm

On your Delco either replace the two browns with a single 10 Ga wire or connect both browns to the output stud on the Delco.

Go to Checkers/Autozone/NAPA and buy the connector plug for a Delco. Check the MAD electrical site to show which way round you need to connect the spades for sense and charge indication.

Make sure the load sense is connected to the primary load point (Usually the starter solenoid) so that your alternator's output takes into account the feeder drop.

[gobie desert]

okay that makes sense...get it sense...hahahaha see i am going delirious with all this fun wiring.
i will try this out.
thanks for clearing it up.
i think.
sort of.