Hey fellas need some help.

So I have a 2000 Neon w/ 80K miles on it that I purchased about 2 months ago. The battery light kept coming on so I got out the ol Chilton's manual and my fluke meter and started troubleshooting. As it turned out the voltage regulator was bad, and as you already know is an integral part of the alternator. At any rate I ended up buying a new alternator and battery and ended up doing the install myself.....no biggie right, problem should have been solved. As it turns out the damn battery light still comes on. It takes oh I'd say about 5 minutes or so after starting the vehicle. But it does this every time, I don't get it. Funny thing too, when I turn the car off and restart it, it won't come on immediately again it will take yet another 5 minutest or so and come back on. So I guess my question is, do I need to look at replacing the cars computer??? I don't think there's anything else in the "charging circuit" left to replace. I bought the car w/ a salvaged title and maybe a different year computer got installed on my 2000.
Any thoughts, or suggestions would be much appreciated.

 

well to help with your question i have a couple of questions.........1) why was the car salvaged? 2) did you replace the battery when you replaced the altenator? 3) have you tried having a shop do a computer diagnostic on it?

the reasons are.......1) if it was salvage for say a fire or flood, you could have wire harness issues....2)sometimes a jacked up alt. will ruin a perfectly good battery......3) you could have a phantom code popping on your computer and it may just need reset.

 

Check the codes on it because it sounds like something is wrong.

 

Redrocc..................thanks for the reply.
So the car was salvaged because it had caught fire from the inside. As a result the passenger side door, seat, glovebox, and passenger side air bag cover had to be replaced. I haven't had this car long so I haven't really had a chance to identify where the computer sits with respect to where the fire occured. At any rate it sounds like you think it may have to do with a wireharness. I'll have to take a stab at it this weekend. How much can I expect to pay a shop to run the codes? And does it pay to go to the dealer vs. any ol shop. Sometimes the dealer mechanics can have more insite than others.
Thanks

 

The computer is in the engine bay. You can run the codes yourself. Turn ignition on, off, on, off, and then leave on and it will flash up codes if there are any. If there is no codes it will just say "done". See if you can get the codes, then post any that it gives you, then we might be able to give you a better idea of what is wrong with it.

 

may just need to reset the computer since you replaced the alt and battery

 

i know that where i live a auto shop will charge about $70 to run a diag. but if you let them do the work that needs to be done then they dont charge for the diag. but like neonSXT said its cheaper for you to do it, if you have a daig machine?.......the connection should be right underneath the steering wheel unless the neaons are different, i don't know cuz to be honest i haven't looked at mine..........also if im not mistaken i think autozone does it for free.........anybody now for sure let me know.....by the way no problem.......thats what we all are here for.