Friday adventure.

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Topic author
csuengr
Posts: 1290
Joined: Sun Mar 24, 2013 10:24 am
Location: Sterling, CO

Friday adventure.

Post by csuengr »

Sorry there are no pictures or videos, I'm lazy that way.

Anyway, My dad and I went out yesterday for a day trip. It was to get out of the heat and get out of town. Simple trip, Hancock Pass, Tomichi Pass, then back home. Hancock was usual. Took all the fun (hard) lines and the temperature at the pass was almost cold. Lots of flowers. From the top of Hancock, we could see snow covering Tomichi, so we had to go out another way. (This is where checking trail conditions before you leave is important. Tomichi Pass has been closed since last year due to a rock slide.) So we took the long way out, intending to go over Tincup Pass back to St. Elmo, the way we came in. Went driving down the valley, then up and over Cumberland Pass, which I didn't know existed. Stopped at the bottom to air back and accidentally killed the engine. I sometimes forget that I have to disengage the clutch to stop. Well, the Cherokee wouldn't even crank over. It was only showing 9 volts on the gauge. Fortunately I stopped on a very slight hill and we were able to push start it. Thank goodness for manual transmissions. The gauge now showed 12.5 volts. The battery connections were good, BTW. Decided to go air up and only got two tires done as there wasn't enough power to engage the clutch on the compressor (York). We decided to go ahead and git so we headed toward Gunnison as it was the closest large town, and still 40+ miles away. On the way there ran into a downpour so had to use my wipers, but I left my headlights off. Got to an O'Reilly's in town and was down to 10.5 volts. Put a volt meter on the alternator output and it was swinging from below 1 volt to over 15. Had them check the battery and their tester said it was bad. So pulled the alternator and noticed a dangling wire, but couldn't find where it went. Took the alternator in and it checked out bad. In the mean time I checked my schematics, which I carry around due to all the rewiring I did, and come to find out that dangling wire was the alternator sense wire. Took make matters worse, nobody in town had the correct alternator in stock. So I purchased one that would physically fit and had to do some rewire to get it to work. Two hours and $250 dollars later, we were heading home. Only 3 1/2 hours to get back.

The battery was probably still good, but five years old, so...
1977 Cherokee S, Ford 5.0, 5 speed, BW 1356, 33 x 10.50 BFG's. No longer my DD.
2007 Mercury Milan, 2.3L, 5-speed, now my DD. 29 mpg average.
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