Landcruiser Not Charging

Lex
It is not on. Does that mean if the bulb is out the alternator will not charge?

On many alternator circuits the reference voltage is derived from the charge light circuit. Bulb blows, alternator does not charge.
Always a good place to start.

cheers

Lexm

Should have said "if the bulb blows or the circuit to the bulb is broken in any way."
The circuit is from ignition voltage from ignition switch through bulb to alternator"

Lex M
Are you sure you know that , first time I've heard that one, Bulb is on a seperate circuit, On mine the connection is directly from the Alternator to the battery via the fusible link, I would be checking brushes if it's done a bit of work,

.

Lex

I had same sort of problem with my old Pajero. Even with a new battery i had no charge light, or so i thought. When i checked it in the dark one night i could just see a very faint glow. Turned out to be the brushes in alternator. No problems after that.

Doug,
Lex is correct, in some alternator circuits a removed or blown globe opens the excitation circuit and the alternator ceases charging.

Case in point was a mate of mine put a Chevy V8 in his ski boat and couldn't work out why his batteries where always flat.

He asked me to have a look at it. I started with the manual from the original vehicle the alternator came from.

Sure enough if you read the diagram, no charge lamp, no charge.

Geoff

I assumed that the battery is not charging meant that the alternator wasn't outputting the necessary voltage to charge.

Question probably should have been "Does the charge light come on when you turn the ignition on before starting the vehicle?"

Obviously if it does look elsewhere.

In the good old pre electronic days, I'd look at the charge light, then look at the brushes. These days the alternator output may be controlled by the ECU (engine control unit). If you don't have the service information for the particular vehicle then your guess is as good as mine as to what the problem is.

Probably should have asked what was meant by "There is no power feed into the alternator." in the original question also.

cheers

Lex

Hi All
Thank you for the advice so far.

The indicator light which is an LED is not working. However, I have pulled the instrument panel out and the LED light appears to be soldered to the circuit board?

I had a workshop pull the alternator of and he said it appears ok. He has now referred me to an auto electrician another town. (One weeks wait as we live in the country).

I spoke with Toyota and they said they would try a changeover alternator as they reckon it probably is a regulator fault in the alternator.

The car has done 102,000 KMS.

Any other comment would be appreciated as I will continue to trace the fault due to the delay here in getting jobs done.

Regards
Norm

If you have no power to white thick wire out the bum of the alt, there is a break in there somewhere....it is not switched but live all the time...i wouldnt be buying an alt from Toyota, untill you can get power there...its one issue you have that i can see from your original post. If the 3 fuses you mention are the fuseable links, you could...could...run a seperate wire from battery poitive to alt fat wire, and see if she charges then...