Voltage Regulator?
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Record Breaker
Joined: Nov 2015
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From: North Carolina
You better believe it HY. This problem taunted me for 7 months. On the negative side, I went through a lot of gymnastics trying to hunt down that problem. On the positive side, I have lots of clean grounds and beefed up connections under my hood. 
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1993 Dodge Dakota LE, 5.2L, auto trans, RWD, 180,500 miles, original owner
EDIT NOTE: If you want to cut to the chase, pull up Post# 130 in this thread to get to the solution. Everything else is trial and error but could be useful to you if you want to read it all.
One thing about a 28 year old vehicle is they always remind you they are 28 years old. The latest is my volt gauge on the dash. All of a sudden I notice it has the heebie jeebies. It vacillates a couple volts back n forth. Only when idling in park or drive. Once you put a load on the engine she steadies herself. Put the multimeter on the battery at idle while the gauge shakes and it holds at 14.1 volts +/- a few hundredths.
History: My PCM took a crap about a year and a half ago. Long story short I put a rebuild on the truck. Works perfectly fine but the voltage regulator in the rebuilt PCM was crap. Rather than get another rebuild, I kept it and, on the advice of Hey You, I installed an external voltage regulator (adjustable). Installation was fine except I was using wimpy wiring and the dash gauge had a severe case of the shakes. I replaced the wimpy wire with fatter wire (think I went from 14 gauge to 12 gauge) and the problem totally cleared up and I've been thrilled ever since. So now the dash gauge shakes again (no where near as bad as when I had the wimpy wiring from the external regulator installation) but it shakes nonetheless. I could hear Ralph telling me to check all the connections. So I did and they were all cinched down. Made no difference in this case.
So my questions are: Should I ignore the cheesy dash gauge? Is this a possible sign my 1-1/2 year old adjustable external voltage regulator has a case of Parkinsons or similar malady?
Your thoughts and opinions, as always, are appreciated.
EDIT NOTE: If you want to cut to the chase, pull up Post# 130 in this thread to get to the solution. Everything else is trial and error but could be useful to you if you want to read it all.
One thing about a 28 year old vehicle is they always remind you they are 28 years old. The latest is my volt gauge on the dash. All of a sudden I notice it has the heebie jeebies. It vacillates a couple volts back n forth. Only when idling in park or drive. Once you put a load on the engine she steadies herself. Put the multimeter on the battery at idle while the gauge shakes and it holds at 14.1 volts +/- a few hundredths.
History: My PCM took a crap about a year and a half ago. Long story short I put a rebuild on the truck. Works perfectly fine but the voltage regulator in the rebuilt PCM was crap. Rather than get another rebuild, I kept it and, on the advice of Hey You, I installed an external voltage regulator (adjustable). Installation was fine except I was using wimpy wiring and the dash gauge had a severe case of the shakes. I replaced the wimpy wire with fatter wire (think I went from 14 gauge to 12 gauge) and the problem totally cleared up and I've been thrilled ever since. So now the dash gauge shakes again (no where near as bad as when I had the wimpy wiring from the external regulator installation) but it shakes nonetheless. I could hear Ralph telling me to check all the connections. So I did and they were all cinched down. Made no difference in this case.
So my questions are: Should I ignore the cheesy dash gauge? Is this a possible sign my 1-1/2 year old adjustable external voltage regulator has a case of Parkinsons or similar malady?
Your thoughts and opinions, as always, are appreciated.
They all have grimlens in the I have to different Dakota's same yr 2 different engines sizes but have some of same problems and 1more then other but different problem and nothing showing it's problem at all. For y it will randomly die or not start or sometime blow a big backfire while driving or starting. . connection is good. .but no answer on the truth of y all I got is grimlens . Or someone hates me lol.
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Record Breaker
Joined: Nov 2015
Posts: 2,232
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From: North Carolina
They all have grimlens in the I have to different Dakota's same yr 2 different engines sizes but have some of same problems and 1more then other but different problem and nothing showing it's problem at all. For y it will randomly die or not start or sometime blow a big backfire while driving or starting. . connection is good. .but no answer on the truth of y all I got is grimlens . Or someone hates me lol.
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Record Breaker
Joined: Nov 2015
Posts: 2,232
Likes: 473
From: North Carolina
That's what I did. That thing was just an elaborate way of keeping wires/cables "organized".
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So I installed this regulator kit on my truck, but it still isn't charging, alternator tests fine when tested at AutoZone, and it's almost like its not putting out any volts, even with the regulator it isn't charging, any ideas on what it could be? I have the switched circuit going to interior lamp fuse under hood fuse box.
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Well it was one of those big box fuses so I just took it out and put one of the female spade connectors on a wire and put it on the hot side and Im pretty sure it is but I just disconnect it afterwards so it isn't drawing voltage, I had it hooked up to the radio fuse in the cab using the add a fuse type deal but when I had it hooked up it blew both 10 amp fuses. So i put it under the hood instead and removed the 20 amp interior lamp fuse and put it on the spade.
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From: Clayton MI
Well, I don't know what the amp draw is for that box..... but, apparently, 10 amps minus whatever the radio wants ain't enough. Still you want that on something that is hot in run only.
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I know, I was just trying to see if it would work, it's only a temporary thing till I get the relay deal that goes directly to the battery, if there is a ground that isn't hooked up or something could that cause the alternator to not generate voltage? Because I tried doing a continuity check between ground on battery and ground on back of alternator but it didn't seem to have a complete circuit
I'm not very good with wiring so I was wondering if it could be a ground problem or a wire problem. Not sure if this matters but if I put a test light on battery negative post with terminal off and pull the "int lamp" fuse the light goes out. Which according to the hanes manual that means there's a short, just not sure if that would correlate with the alternator not wanting to charge.
I'm not very good with wiring so I was wondering if it could be a ground problem or a wire problem. Not sure if this matters but if I put a test light on battery negative post with terminal off and pull the "int lamp" fuse the light goes out. Which according to the hanes manual that means there's a short, just not sure if that would correlate with the alternator not wanting to charge.