Electrical gremlins strike again!

[Gary Lewis]

Steve has pointed out, and rightly so, that it is not necessary to take the ammeter out of the circuit - as long as you put the output wire of the 3G to the battery or battery-side of the relay and you don't try to put a large new/extra load on the fuse box.

The downside is that the ammeter will always show a discharge, and the more accessories you have on the more discharge.

Anyway, wire it as shown below, but ignore the regulator as that's a 1G diagram.

[FuzzFace2]

Gary Lewis wrote

Steve has pointed out, and rightly so, that it is not necessary to take the ammeter out of the circuit - as long as you put the output wire of the 3G to the battery or battery-side of the relay and you don't try to put a large new/extra load on the fuse box.

The downside is that the ammeter will always show a discharge, and the more accessories you have on the more discharge.

Anyway, wire it as shown below, but ignore the regulator as that's a 1G diagram.

Well heck that sounds easy enough.
So follow the 3G wiring write up other than bypassing the gauge.
If I was to put more load on the charging system then run it off the battery with its own fuse box.

Brings up another question, what if you went with the converted AMP gauge to volt gauge from Rocket man and wired his way could you still wire it as you said, 3G output to the battery and the gauge would read ok?
Thanks Gary
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

Pardon the back-of-the-napkin drawing, but you could put a converted ammeter as a voltmeter in as shown below.  The relay is needed to ensure the voltmeter only reads when the key is on or it'll be a parasitic draw on the battery.  I haven't checked to see how much, but I'm going to put a relay in.

And, the relay can easily be put in the ground leg for the voltmeter, either in the cab or under the hood.  Further, you can do the ground change under the hood if you want.  So if you were to make the ground change under the hood you'd just cut the yellow/light green wire off the shunt and put it to a relay that grounded it when the key was turned on.

At this point you still have the shunt in place and are, therefore, limited on the amount of current you can draw via the stock fuse box.  But if you only run stock accessories or if you wire the new ones back to the battery via a fuse then you are good.  And Fuselink M is really only designed to carry the stock load anyway.

[Gsmblue]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

1G and 3G are not that far apart
The 1G has an external regulator, and the 3G has twice as much amperage to put out.

A harness plug, a fuse and a washer are all you really need.

If I can find a kit I may do it...

[ArdWrknTrk]

There are 'kits' available, but basically just a collection of parts that you'd pay half for if you were to buy the parts yourself. (Like $40 vs $80 dollars)

I made the list and all the links to Amazon in another thread.
Gary was going to duplicate it, but I don't know if he has.

[Gsmblue]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

I made the list and all the links to Amazon in another thread.
Gary was going to duplicate it, but I don't know if he has.

Time for me to use the search function!

[ArdWrknTrk]

I'm guessing it was your '82 Wiring Mess thread, back in May...

[Gsmblue]

So...... another twist to the story, kind of.

Today the Bronco (Espy) developed a dead battery - For reasons i will add to my project thread later.

We got the jump leads out, started right up.

Got the multimeter on the battery terminals and sure enough 26VAC... urgh.... so i need 2 alternators!

I am away for a week. So now i need to decide what to do 1G/3G???!!! Mumble, mumble...

[Gary Lewis]

Well, you might be our poster boy.  How 'bout doing a video of a 3G install?  We'll put it on that page on the website.  And talk you through all the bits and pieces before you do it.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Hey!
Matthew was supposed to be our stoo..... Er, poster child.

I'm all for anyone documenting the process.

[ArdWrknTrk]

You know you can replace just the 1G diode board (for $20 and some time with a soldering gun)

Count on ~1/2 hour more than the simple R&R.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Rectifier-Bridge-Diodes-Ford-Motorcraft-1G-Alternator-/330336381141?redirect=mobile

[Gsmblue]

This weekend I changed out both the alternators for reman 1G.

Sorry for not doing the 3G upgrade, I just had to get these back on the road! Both are running happy again :)

[ArdWrknTrk]

Why apologize?

If you don't have the time or resources to install the far superior 3G, or even just swap the 1G diode board, go back with the 1G and it'll probably last another decade or more.  

[Gsmblue]

Indeed!  I had to take the path of least resistance on this one, I prefer to do things properly and the 3G upgrade is the proper thing to do. But alas time is no mans friend!

Thanks for all the help!

[Gary Lewis]

Yep, there are times we must take the "quick and easy" road rather than the "fix it better than new" road.  As said, I did that on Big Blue when I first got him and the Powermaster alternator died.  Luckily there was a regulator still on the fender and a 1G sitting on the shelf.  A few minutes later I was able to get back to figuring out what the other, much more major, problems were with the truck.