Bill Putney wrote:

> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 11 Nov 2004 21:22:04 -0500, Bill Putney > wrote:
>>
>> ||
>> ||Except, after I had learned my lesson years earlier on aftermarket
>> ||manuals, a few months after I bought my daughter a used car, the
>> very ||first opportunity that came up for diagnosis and repair of an
>> electrical ||problem, in a weak moment, I went down the street and
>> sprung for a whole ||$13 for a Haynes manual. Due to a visibly hidden
>> fuse that was not ||shown in the "TYPICAL" schematics of the Haynes, I
>> ended up replacing a ||perfectly good factory alternator when all that
>> was wrong was that the ||in-line fuse that the manual did not show had
>> mechanically fractured.
>> With all due respect, that's just not good basic diagnostics. Every
>> parts store
>> worth giving your business to has an alternator tester...
>
>
> see below
>
>> ...A quick check would have
>> told you the problem was elsewhere. That's not excusing the omission,
>> but there
>> is some shared responsibility here...
>
>
> see below
>
>> ...Haynes is advertised as a "Tuneup and repair *guide*".
>
>
> My primary bone of contention is that "typical" schematics are used. I
> make the analogy to using a map that shows hiways between New York and
> Philadelphia to drive from Denver to LA. To sell someone such a map for
> that purpose is fraudulent. There's no such thing as a schematic to be
> used as a "guide". It either represents the circuits of interest and is
> a useful troubleshooting too, or it is as worthless as that map. If
> it's only a guide, then leave the schematics out, because putting them
> in at all implies something that isn't delivered.
>
> They do not pretend
>
>> to be a substitute for the FSM, but for the money they are a good
>> alternative,
>> and the only company currently providing one. And yes, some Haynes
>> books are
>> better than others.
>> Texas Parts Guy
>
>
> You are correct about having it tested - in the attempt to keep my posts
> short (which is a problem for me anyway), I just failed to mention that
> - the fact is that I took it to two stores, and the standard adapters
> they had with their alterantor test setups would not adapt to the
> particular alternator (for the record it was on a '96 Mercury Mystique -
> for some reason, the connectors are not typical of other Ford
> alternators). The one store was honest about it - did their best to use
> alligator clips to hook it up the best they knew how - they didn't seem
> very confident in how to hook it up, and it failed the test - I took
> that with a grain of salt. Went to a competitor who had the exact same
> generic tester setup with the same standard adapters (that didn't fit
> the alternator) - their guy faked it and simply told me it failed the
> test. The problem turned out to be a mechanically fractured (not
> thermally/electircally blown) MegaFuse™. An alternator is not going to
> blow the same time a fuse happens to mechanically fracture.

If I wasn't clear - that fuse was not part of or built into the
alternator - it was in the hot wire going from the battery tot he
alternator, and was hidden underneath the intake plenum.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
adddress with the letter 'x')


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