Help: Somethings Wrong, Maybe Electrical

[Ruffels]

hey everyone, driving today and the car just didnt seem good

the car couldnt hold its idle, pretty much dropped to 200rpm or stalled unless i kept the throttle up

the windscreen wipers were going extreamly slow

and the power windows were also going slow

and the stereo wasnt really working either

i took my 1 week old battery down to where i bought it and they did a test on it and it seems to be fine

could it just be my alternator, or something worse? what are peoples thoughts

cheers

-Ruffels

on that note does an rb5 alternaotr fit on an rb20?

[cowie165]

Hi Mark. Why did you replace your last battery?

[Ruffels]

it died

but i drove on that battery for 6 months (since i bought the car) and slow over time jut took longer to crank the engine over, til one day she just didnt start

[Craved]

measure the voltage at the battery whens its running .. should be about 14.5V

[cowie165]

ok cool. Did you replace the old battery with a similar one? Sometimes people downsize and go too far, leaving a battery that measures 12V and 14.5V when it needs to but isn't large enough to run the electrics properly.

I agree with your diagnosis. It could be the alternator (but unlikely), but I wouldn't rule out the battery.

What CCA rating were you using for new and old batteries?

PS It sucks when your car plays up and you're trying to work it out. I have a Mazda that has a jumpy idle that I'm still trying to sort

[Ruffels]

nah it was a bigger capacity battery (commodore one) and i jsut replaced it with another one the same...

had the battery professionally analysied tody, apparently it isnt the battery, just finished in the garage putting a new alternator in, hopefully this works

i'll report back

-Ruffels