battery gauge question

[92blackz34]

ok my car has been dieing out lately when come to a stop sign or are in park idling. today when i was at the stop sign it almost died out but then idled back up but i noticed my battery gauge dropped way down when it did that and was bouncing around 1/4 and half and then the rest of the way home my gauge stayed a hair under half on the gauge? any ideas?

[Psych0matt]

sounds like your battery is dying. maybe your alt, but if i were you I'd take it to autozone and have them test both. its free, quick, and easy

[19Cutlass94]

well.... alt, cable, battery, start tesing things and see whats going on............

[92blackz34]

ok i will my battery was brand new in jan or feb and my alt is 2 years old if that even but ya il have them checked

[Psych0matt]

i had an alt that was used for a week, and then sat for like 9 months, and was completely dead when i went to start the car back up

[92blackz34]

if it was bad would that make my car die out? and its hesitant sometimes

[1990lumina]

Yes it would make it die out. The computer needs at least 12volts to run properly, and make the engine run properly too. Feed it low voltage and everything will run wierd.

 

When the alternator was dying on my Lumina everything electrical went bonkers, the car stalled and it wouldn't start lol

[Dark Ride]

Yes it would make it die out. The computer needs at least 12volts to run properly, and make the engine run properly too. Feed it low voltage and everything will run wierd.

 

When the alternator was dying on my Lumina everything electrical went bonkers, the car stalled and it wouldn't start lol

My Tach would read negative RPMs

[ns87]

My base digital gauge would read from 1-10 based on how fast I was revving my engine lol. And the cluster read ERROR everytime I hit the brakes!

[rockfangd]

lol i dont even want to get into what i went through with my 3 alternators oh and did i mentionthe aux post causing havoc

[92blackz34]

i got it checked it was my alt. at high rpms it was putting out proper volts but at low rpms with a load it dropped to 12 and a little lower which was causing it to die out. so good thing for warranty ill have a new free alt put in tom

[toms92gpse]

I had about the same thing happening a few years ago, it was my battery though. Anytime i would stop it would stall, the battery just wasn't helping out at all. I got a new battery and it has been good ever since. A slipping belt will cause an alt to read to low at idle too, when you get that engine speed up it spins it fast enough to make up for the slipping belt.

[92blackz34]

ok so i had my new alt put it on fri. and after driving for a little ways it still only goes to half way the batt gauge and when slow down to a stop and its at low rpm it drops below half. so today i went and got my batt tested its state of health is 100% and charge was 85%. any ideas as to what this may be now?

[Dark Ride]

short in the system? does anyone know how to do a test for draw?