Good update. Bronze was right, I used my old regulator trigger wire (relay triggered by ignition) to trigger another relay (relay ception lol) that was powered directly from the battery via a 10 gauge wire, and then 10 gauge to the regulator plug (the middle one, bottom in my case). Voltage is rock steady now. On the multimeter it reads 14.34, the gauge it reads 13 but I have a feeling that has something to do with the way I have it wired. It fluctuates quickly when turning on large draw items which id expect it to but it stabilizes after it adjusts the field.

When I do a rewire of this truck again, I’m definitely going to run some big *** wires to the regulator so I don’t have to deal with this again lol.

Thank y’all for the help!

 

I'm still not sure I follow how you have yours wired up but the bottom line is that however you have the battery send power to the regulator, it has to be done with a 12ga wire. Anything thinner and your voltage will fluctuate. If it acts up again, check your connections and if that doesn't solve it then replace the 12ga power wire again. The system can get sassy on you and decide to have a sit-in for no apparent reason...at least that's been my experience.

 

This is a 30 second made up drawing of how it is setup if this helps. I can take images or a video tomorrow if you’d like me to. Old is on the left, new is on the right. Of course 12v is the battery positive (fused).



If I didn’t mention as well, the regulator body is grounded directly to the case of the alternator, which has two ground paths as well, being directly into the block and through the ground strap but also through a dedicated ground cable I added recently. Both of these go directly to the negative terminal on the battery. Seems like the voltage is nice and steady now, my LEDs don’t seem to be flickering anymore, as with my dome light as well.

 

Where is that "Ignition Switch Relay" located?

 

It’s in a relay box under the hood. I rewired the truck somewhat when I switched to a carb. The ignition switch still gets its normal constant feed, and the wire for the ignition (I think for the computer on the stock harness) coming out of the bulkhead connector triggers the “ignition switch relay” as well as other ignition trigger circuits like fuel pump, distributor, etc

 

OK, gotcha. Makes sense now. All the important stuff is 12ga.

If it matters, here's how mine is wired...(not shown: I spliced in a fuse holder w/fuse in the 12ga wire going from the batt to the relay...just to be overly cautious).

 

So your regulator has 3 ports?

 

No, just two. The lower one (or upper one depending how your reg is oriented) has a wire coming out (that goes to the alt) that I splice in the 12 gauge power wire just inches from the reg. That was that three way connection I was speaking about a few replies back.

I know you're wondering how that works connecting a 12ga wire to a 14 ga wire. It would seem a connection is only as good as it's weakest point. I wish I could answer you but I don't have an answer. It just works. The only thing I can think of is that a 12ga wire has less resistance and the few inches of 14ga going into the plug doesn't add enough resistance to make the voltage fluctuate. But what do I know? I'm not an electrician.

 

Im assuming it has something to do with the voltage drop over the distance. A few inches, the voltage drop is minimal. But a few feet? I feel like that’s where the issue is with mine. The amperage was fine for 18 gauge but the voltage drop was so high with the distance it went so I guess it was enough to make the regulator not actually know the true voltage at the battery

 

Yeah, we're pretty much saying the same thing. Couldn't tell you if that's the reason but I can't come up with anything else. Bottom line you got to have the right wire for the job. Thinner than 12ga doesn't get it done. I'm glad yours leveled out. I mean, any wires/cables coming out of the battery are pretty chunky.