Amp gage jumping to discharge and back?
 

My amp gage occasionally will jump to the far side of discharge and then back to normal just as quick - probably less than a second in length. I usually notice it sitting at a light while idling - but that may just because I scan the gages when stopped. Driving down the road it seems to always be stable. What's causing that - switching in the voltage regulator? I'm running the solid state VR.

There was a thread not long ago about something similar. I had same happen a few years ago and once I checked the big wire connections at back of amp gauge, I found them to be really damaged from heat and the insulation on the wires was melted, connections were failing as well. I have always worried about the fact that they run all the amperage up to a little gauge in my dash.:eek:

+1 on what Bernica said, especially his commentary about the big wires and the little gauge.

Your amperage gauge is actually talking to you but we sometimes have a hard time understanding what they are trying to tell us Dan. In your case I would translate it sort of like this, "I am older now and I think I am going to try to burn your car to the ground."

The best medicine is replace the amp gauge with a volts gauge and substantially downsize the wiring. You'll be happy, the gauge will be happy and in particular your car will be happy.


Ed

I was under the dash this morning tightening up the oil line fitting to the pressure gage and looked reasonably closely at the amp gage connections. At 65 it's a chore crawling up under the dash of one of these anymore. They look fine and are tight - car only has about 600 miles on it. It's more like a switch being thrown - that's why I'm wondering about the voltage regulator.

It may be your fan kicking in? Especially since you said it occurs when you are sitting at a traffic light. The fan hammers the amperage draw. Just a thought.

I think it's the fan. Try throwing your fan override switch while you watch the amp gauge and see if it looks the same.;)

Not trying to start anything here, but I just don't get why anyone wants an amperage gauge. Perhaps the originals had them, but that doesn't seem like a good reason. A voltage gauge gives you all the information you need about your charging system without having massive amounts of current coursing through heavy cables just behind the dash... For no good reason. JMHO.

I bet that's it - I'll experiment with that and see. I have the HD fan also.

I agree. But it's what came with the instrument set when I built the car. Besides, I also have a 67 Plymouth GTX with 49 year old wiring and an amp gage. It's about 35 years over due to have an instrument panel fire so I'm kind of used to living with the risk. One of these days I will get around to switching to a volt gage in both of them.

Dan,

I have the heavy duty fan as well and you can see the amp gauge move when the fan is kicking on.

DanEC, on your 67 GTX, I seem to remember that factory cars used what was called a shunted ammeter, which did not route all the current through the gauge. If the wiring to your gauge is small diameter, then you have a shunted ammeter, and no need to worry.

Could be - I didn't pay much attention to it when I had the dash apart but off-hand I don't remember any large wiring there. Actually, the instruments panel uses a large printed circuit sheet to power everything in the instrument cluster so you are probably right. But - they are well know for electrical fires. I know someone who had one back in the 70s and his ownership of it ended with a dash fire. But he still misses it. :)

I hear you! That's why I bought a lighted flexible bore scope with a hand-held display. It does wonders for my back and shoulders when snooping around under the dash. My contortionist days are somewhat behind me...:eek::cool:

The Smiths amp gauge does not pass all of the current through the little measuring apparatus inside the gauge, it shunts it off instead. That said, you're still putting a good bit of current through the gauge on two occasions: 1) When your battery is down, like after some prolonged cranking, and it is recharging; and 2) For that momentary instance when all your high amperage fans kick on and the alternator has not caught up. Other than that, there is only a trickle of current running through your amp gauge; hardly any at all. That said, I still have a ten gauge parallel connection running from the circuit breaker to the fuse box. The amp gauge still registers accurately, only in a muted fashion, and then current on those two occasions is cut by more than half. It's a very simple upgrade and it will make that big swing of the needle, when the fans come on, about a quarter of an inch or so less.

Let me Take shot at this
 

DanEC Dan let me give you some info on this problem,
First the cobra charging system is limited to 70amps with changing the amp gauge to a voltage gauge. It took 9 years but I melted the insolators on the amp gauge. TOO MUCH AMPAGE going through this gauge. Must cobras run a 63 amp alt. You are at the limit of this gauge. Old days cobra had a 38 to 45 amp charging system The car had headlights, wipers, and 2 fuel pumps, Some had a heater as an option and a battery small one about 500cca At idle the charging system produced about 25-28 amps. enough to cover the Ign system, fuel pumps, and lights. NOt 100% sure about electrical fans like today.
Here's the thing, if you have undersize pulleys on the motor, the charging system can't handle the load. If you are using a Tarus fan, they draw between 18-22 amps at high speed alone. Add the igntion system if MSD another 10 amps, fuel pumps, 4-10 amps. Lights 2-5 amps. Half the total charging system
When you get a chance measure the pulleys on the crank and water pump. IF they are 1-1, ( same size ) you are OK. IF the crank is smaller, you are under size and to have the motor idling below 800-900 rpms you have no charging ampage to the car and all drains are pulling from the battery. THat fan turns on and the surge to turn it on can be 40-60 amps. This is the reason for the amp meter to pin neg side. It will come back in a second or 2.
Bottom line you have 4 choices
1, replace the amp gauge with a volt gauge from autometer. Cost about $60.00 for gauge. Remove screws from dash panel and cock it down to get to gauge. Nut and bolt 2 white wires togeather with a 3rd wire for the voltage gauge. Need a ground wire, and swap the light out of the smith gauge into the back of the auto meter gauge. Take about 1 hour with a screw gun. Solder the connectors. heat wrap seal and tape up. Reassembly dash Make sure wires can't rub on anything. This will pervent a dash fire but not fix the amp load.
2, Pulleys on motor, if not the same size, get the same ones in size. This will help cooling the motor also. This will increase the speed of the alt raise the charging and help decrease the surge load when the fan kicks on. Still will get the spike throught the amp gauge, again same issue as line 1.
3, Replace this fan with a good cfm and lower amp draw. 16" works ok. (Side note) Do you have the 2 little fans in front of the radiator or the deflector shield? This is important. I like the 2 little fans BUT they do nothing in helping direct the air smoothly into the radiator. As what temp thermostat are you running? REcommend a 180F thermostat from an RB dodge motor. Works great with a little grinding to get it to fit in the FE manifold The flow opening is 1/2" larger than the FE one. Makes a big different in cooling the motor.
This will help keep the fan from coming on.
4 PA performance sell a 95 amp kit for a cobra with a voltage box and direct bolt in unit. Also has a 125 amp fusable link to protect encase of a short on this side of the charging system. You will still need a Voltage meter. About $350.00 lifetime warrantty. I run this setup because of 3 cooling fans to motor,2 fuel pumps, ecu, fuel injectors, MSD ignition system, ( this draws about 10 amps ,not the 2-3 that others have said here, I measured the load) lights. I also have a heater but not used. At idle I pull just under 32 amps. My OEM alt of 63 couldn't handle this load and drained the battery at idle and had a hard time recovering when racing. I had to recharge the battery after every run. I had under drive pulleys and went 1-1 ratio. This helped a little
I don't know how you wired this coolant fan but would look into running it directly to the battery and ground and use a signal wire to turn it on and off. THis will pervent the surge to the amp gauge. Over time the plastic insolators are going to fail and need to be replaced. I got 9 years and lucky I caught mine at home in the garage. IT could have burnt the car to the ground on the next outting. Good luck with your problem Sorry from long leter, trying to give you all options for repair. Rick L. Ps as far as charging the needle should read on the pos side between 0 and 30 amps without alot of load. This is with a fully charged battery. The gauge is not that accurate. It's in the ball park. Pss got any pictures of the GTX and info???? Looking for one for a friend.

A great and concise write up! Well done!! Patrick too!:cool:

Rick - I'm running pretty much all stock stuff - standard Powermaster alternator (seems like it was 60 amps), stock Ford metal pulleys and ERA's HD puller fan with their standard wiring. No auxiliary fans. Nothing special and the fan and lights are about it for load - even run points distributor. Engine runs cool - matter of fact I may need to put a higher temp thermostat in as it runs tool cool - about 75 C except gets up to about 80 at a stop light. Oil never gets over 80 C.

You know, if you could just combine the best of Rick and me, together, in to one single author, you'd have the best advice money could buy. I could go by Pat, and then we'd add Rick's name to that, and just combine the two and, collectively, use that combination name. I think that's a great idea.;)

Let me clear up a few things...

The ammeter only indicates the net current in and out of the battery. You can have a 100A load and a 100A alternator and have zero current through the ammeter.

Once the car starts, the ammeter will likely have a strong - and temporary - period when it's recharging the battery, after which it will settle down to near zero. (That's only the current going through the ammeter, not the current flow from the alternator into all the loads.)

It's not the end of the world to show a negative flow, as long as it's temporary. In fact it's normal. We've only become used to never seeing the reverse current because newer cars don't have a gauge.

That said, a voltmeter is really a better indicator of the state of the charging system than an ammeter, but it's not a necessity for a high-output alternator. For certain applications, I can create a shunt that bypasses about half the current around the ammeter.

If you want to substitute a voltmeter, I have more electrically-efficient ways to do it than as described above, at least for the later harnesses that use the big plugs between the main and dash harness.

Wait a minute, didn't I write that?:confused:

My car has just started doing this. Hopefully not to hijack the thread but to add to the discussion, would this be a gauge issue or an earth issue? It might do this for a couple minutes then the fluctuations stop.
While the gauge is fluctuating, the headlights also pulse...



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