Well heres the story. My cars been turning over slowly, well not really but the other day i noticed that it hesitated to start. i payed little attention to it and drove on. well tonight (about 3 days later) i went to work to get my schedule for tomarrow, i was there maybe 5-6 minutes. came out and the car wouldnt start. It was like the batery was dead. How could this have happened i thought? I called a friend to get me. we tryed to jump the car but no luck. still cranked slowly. I went home and got the brand new battery from my other car and it cranked over just fine. so im thinking wtf. I went to advance auto got it checked out . the guy seemed in a rush. the voltage was 14.3 but it only had about 21.3 amps.(very low). ive never seen that though. ive alwasy thought voltage would be low as well. I thought that was kinda wierd but i guess its possible. so what do you think? I got a bad alt? or a drain on battery. IM not sure. Im in the process of removing the alt now, and i ordered the new one 158.88. high price but i cant afford to have this car out ,so i bought it. just thought i would get other opinions> -Devin

search the forums there are many many answers..

heres a couple........check your ground points especially the ground on the thermostat. check the starter solenoid .... other than that.....search because i feel like i'll be spoiling you my brotha. hehe =)

shoot ive been searching for a week and i think i got mine solved.

What kind of test did the parts place do? If it's a true load test with a carbon pile tester, then the alternator is bad. If he just checked it with an ammeter while the car was idling, then he's a complete freakin' idiot. 21 amps is normal for idling engine with no electrical devices turned on.

From what you described, though, it sounds like a bad battery. AND battery failure will kill the alternator if you continue to drive it like that. Since you're replacing the alternator anyhow, just throw a $40 battery in from Wal-Mart to cover your a$$.

I have a simmilar problem. A few wekks ago on a cold wet morning my car died on me. All symptoms pointed to Alternator (Slow wipers, Dim dash and headlights, stereo turning on and off). I got a used (but bench tested good) alt from a friend. Then yesterday morning it happened again. I had my original Alt tested and it was still good. So I'm going to be getting a new battery and checking all my connections to alt and battery. Mulitmeter here I come!

If he just checked it with an ammeter while the car was idling, then he's a complete freakin' idiot

We run the car at 2000rpms for 10 seconds, then the car idles for 10 seconds, and the machine tells you whats up. The amps being low dont matter. Those testers are shitty. Almost everytime i test a alt. the amps are extremly low like that.

Just an update for those who want to know. I found out that my harmonic ballancer is seperating and the alternator belt portion wasn't spinning like it should. Plus all my belts were rubbing and making horrid noises. I still havn't swapped it but it looks like that's the problem. I'll check back in and let you all know.


****Update****
http://www.sr20forum.com/img/data/500/medium/Crank_Pulley.JPG

It was the crank pulley. As you can see it's in two pieces.