Ok. So I added a ground strap from the alt to the strut tower. There was a spark. Drove down the road, and the battery light came on. WTF? Drove about 30 minutes down the road, and the lights got dim, and then went dead [sm=bangbang.gif] Great. So I figured my battery charge was low, and I'd have it charged tomorrow. Went to work to get the battery from my work truck. Car fired right up, and on the way back lights got dim AGAIN! So, from here it seems my harness may have a short in it, since I bought a new alternator, and a good working battery. The bolt on the alternator is a ground strap right? Should not have sparked??? Any ideas?

 

thats sounds like that should not have happened, really shouldnt spark

 

Exactly. There was another ground about 5 inches away, but still seemed odd. Even so, is there was something that burned out in the alt, replacing it should have fixed it. Hooked the car up to an OBDII scanner and got torque converter codes, and I did not convert this car to 5 speed. Volt meter shows the battery at 10.00 with the car off, and 9.81 with the car running. It was around 9.78 and declined to 9.77 after two minutes of running at idle. Only thing left is to replace the harness.

 

You do know the voltage regulator on the neon is in the PCM right?

And no, it should not spark when you connect a ground strap, that means you have battery voltage leaking out into the ground system somewhere, should be fun to track down!

 

The volt reg is not in the alt? Hmmmm

 

Not sure if you're being sarcastic or not there ghost but your alternator on your neon does not have an internal regulator as is the case with most all dodge vehicles, they use the ECM/PCM to control the regulation. The alternator is simply a rotor, stator and rectifier with two field brushes. The two wire grey plug coming off the alternatorgoes right to the PCM which does nothing more than ground one of the field terminals to produce output.

 

I am being sincere. So I could theoretically fried the pcm when that spark came through?

 

Yep I hate to say it but veru possible if you had a large enough transient voltage spike

 

you should be throwing a code for it and I bet you anything that its this code...

41
P0622 Generator Field Improper Switching

Witch is in the alternator itself and you will need a new alternator and it will be fixed... now ask me how i know...

 

New alternator and still not fixed. Already went there. New battery too.