Outer Limits 4x4 Board

just a silly thought, but due to old cars i drive alt,s are one thing that fail out bush on a sunday or when wet.
so can i hook up 2 in the engine and maybe have wiring to swith over at failure?its extra fan belt drag but hey, reliablity is a must.
done too many roadside repairs.

Running into two seperate battery circuits, yes (main starting battery, and second for accessories - fridge/UHF/etc). Not both alts connected to the one battery though.

Would mean that you would not get caught out by a dud alternator (you could still parallel up the two batteries together), and give you the flexibility to isolate one battery and jumper everything to the other if you get a dud battery.

i have two alts hooked up , i was going to run 2 circuts but i never worried about it in the end

they are both hooked up to the same battery , ran another sense wire for the 2nd alt and used the 2nd alts dash light wire for the light on the dash as it needed it for some reason where the factory alt will run fine with out it connected , when i get excited i will hook up another dash light so i know which alt ( if ever ) stops working

its aford not a nissan wrote:i have two alts hooked up , i was going to run 2 circuts but i never worried about it in the end

they are both hooked up to the same battery , ran another sense wire for the 2nd alt and used the 2nd alts dash light wire for the light on the dash as it needed it for some reason where the factory alt will run fine with out it connected , when i get excited i will hook up another dash light so i know which alt ( if ever ) stops working

Some alternators need to see the initial resistance of the dash light to get excited into charging.

Cheers

Hi claud, it shouldn’t be a problem.

The VW Kombis were made here, ( in the 60s ) if you needed more power than was available with the standard VW, you could order one with a high current output and all they did was add another alternator to the system and both fed into the one battery.

I been running 2 alt into 1 battery no probs. they run seperate exciter wires. Volt gauge runs a bit funny, but the std alt couldnt keep up driving at night with the thermos, lights, etc but with the 2nd alt on the fridge will run flat out for 4 days and still start the diesel engine no prbs when i set camp, compared to previously getting half a day before the fridge would stop working due to flat battery

I've seen one run 2 alternators when the factory job was a 24 volt system. so running the standard 24 volt system, and a 12 volt alternator for various accessories. (it was a riced up patrol import )

If your only concern is breaking one in the bush then i'd start carrying a spare alternator in the back.

Fact is the alternator is likely to wear out, or corrode due to water/mud ingest. Having a second plan-b alternator spinning and subject to the elements is not ideal for a backup system