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KTPhil 
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Joined: April 06, 2006
Posts: 34013
Location: Conejo Valley, CA
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 Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2017 9:25 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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Agreed, those numbers appear normal, though it may work better with everything cleaned up.
That generator looks strange to me, especially the wiring connections and narrow cooling slot. Must be an early model, maybe lower output than the newer 6V generators? |
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jessousa
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Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2017 10:37 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| sjbartnik wrote: |
These numbers all look pretty normal for a 6v generator system.
I think you have not done your generator test correctly - with the numbers you are seeing above, it's clear the generator is working. |
I also think there's something wrong with that reading but I couldn't get anything grounding DF and multimeter on the generator body
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VW Beetle Limousine de Luxe 1962 |
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vpn1965
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Joined: December 14, 2016
Posts: 33
Location: Brasil
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2017 3:17 pm Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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Hello!
today i've worked in my beetle ,6v, and ´had the same problems as you do!
The swicht almost cacthed fire when i tuned the ligths on, and the light of the headlights was weak.
I´ve opened the light switch and cleaned all contacts and wire brushed them.
Now the lights are bright as supposed to be!! and the power consumption decline from 12 amps to 9.5 amps.
I suggest to you do the same! |
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EVfun
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Joined: April 01, 2012
Posts: 5481
Location: Seattle
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| Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2017 5:31 pm Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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A good ground path test is to connect a ring terminal and wire to a solid engine point (on the generator body using a regulator screw is best.) Connect another wire with a ring terminal to the battery post negative battery clamp. Redo the connections at both ends of the battery ground cable while setting this up. Now monitor the voltage between those 2 grounds in the real world. You may find situations where the needle shows 1/10 volt, perhaps 3/10 volt while cranking, and these are often harmless. Any voltage you measure with this does indicate main ground problems, and too much to often will prevent the battery from charging even while you have a good charging system.
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| Wildthings wrote: |
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jessousa
Samba Member
Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2017 5:25 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| vpn1965 wrote: |
Hello!
today i've worked in my beetle ,6v, and ´had the same problems as you do!
The swicht almost cacthed fire when i tuned the ligths on, and the light of the headlights was weak.
I´ve opened the light switch and cleaned all contacts and wire brushed them.
Now the lights are bright as supposed to be!! and the power consumption decline from 12 amps to 9.5 amps.
I suggest to you do the same! |
The lights are bright and the cleaning solved another issue I had with turning lights brake light. They all work fine now but I'm quite confused , after measuring power consumption again. Now I have 4,6A turning key on, 14,6A with headlights on.
The voltage readings are a bit different but I'm not sure if yesterday's readings didn't have the interference of the choke.
Idle 6,15V
High rev 7,3V
Headlights on - idle 6,05V
Headlights on - high rev 6,7V hight beam drops to 6,6V
Regulador B+ - idle 6,25V
Regulator B+ - high rev 7,34V
Regulador B+ - lights on idle 6,05V
Regulador B+ - lights on high rev 7,02V
Regulador B+ - high beam idle 5,93V
Regulador B+ - high beam high rev 6,8V
Pressing the brushes didn't make any difference
The generator light is turning on again with headlights on and glows more accelerating the engine. When I tested it yesterday it wasn't so dark as today. Maybe I didn't notice the glow because it was not dark enough.
So, today all the conclusions from yesterday seem to be wrong. Maybe the problem is really on the charging system.
Now to complicate things I can't loose generator's pulley nut. It's too tight. Bended the screw driver and no movement at all.
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flyboy161
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Joined: December 26, 2009
Posts: 2091
Location: Perry, GA
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jessousa
Samba Member
Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2017 2:02 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| flyboy161 wrote: |
| I'm kind of hopping in on this a little late but doesn't that appear to be a 12 volt regulator? |
It came with the car and I assumed it's Ok. Any way I can check that?
I'm gonna buy an impact wrench to take out the generator. If I don't succeed after that repair I'll get a new generator and regulator and hope that will be the end of this problem.
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bluebus86
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Joined: September 02, 2010
Posts: 11075
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| Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2017 5:59 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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[quote="jessousa"]
| flyboy161 wrote: |
| I'm kind of hopping in on this a little late but doesn't that appear to be a 12 volt regulator? |
It came with the car and I assumed it's Ok. Any way I can check that?
I'm gonna buy an impact wrench to take out the generator. If I don't succeed after that repair I'll get a new generator and regulator and hope that will be the end of this problem.[/quoteu]
every regulator I have seen has the voltage marked on it. if it was a 12 volt regulator, youd likely not be getting the results you have
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flyboy161
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flyboy161
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Location: Perry, GA
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| Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2017 7:15 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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It sounds like you checked max output of the generator. Just to go over it again:
Disconnect D+ and DF from the regulator. Attach positive lead of the multimeter to D+ and ground the negative lead to DF on the generator body. With engine running voltage should increase to approximately 20 volts, but only do this test for a few seconds as the generator internals will overheat.
If the above test fails, it may be caused by the generator becoming depolarized (not enough magnetism to start the generating process).
To polarize the generator, remove the fan belt, run a jumper wire from DF on the regulator to the generator case (grounding the DF terminal). Now connect a wire from the + terminal on the battery to D+ on the regulator. The generator should now start to spin. A few seconds is enough for this test.
You can take the wire from the regulator B+ terminal and do this, but check that it is the one coming from the starter, not the one going to the left side of the engine bay.
If the generator doesn't spin, it's faulty. It's rebuild time (or at least it needs an auto electrician to look at it). If the generator spins, reconnect everything back normally and check the function of the charging light. If it still glows at higher rpm, then your regulator is suspect.
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http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=603879
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http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=612776
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http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=611483 |
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jessousa
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Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2017 10:35 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| flyboy161 wrote: |
Sorry, did a little digging and it appears you have an early type 3 regulator mounted on the fan shroud. As bluebus says, it should be marked with the voltage somewhere, either 6 or 12.
A couple more questions if you please?
1. How long have you owned the car?
2. How long has this problem been happening? |
I bought it 1 month ago. I noticed this the first time I took it for a drive at Night.
About the generator test. Its body seems to be isolated because I can't get any reading so I grounded DF at engine body. Is that wrong?
About the regulator I'll look for its specs.
Now I'm unable to go on because of the pulley's nut tightness.
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flyboy161
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jessousa
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| Posted: Tue Oct 24, 2017 2:58 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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Took pulley out but I still have some question about this generator. After reading about it here at the forum I'm still not sure about the correct method to replace brushes on thin slot generators. Is it really necessary to remove the generator in order to do such a simple job? It's a lot of work just to replace brushes.
It's not the present case because I want to check the generator but for the future it would be nice to have a simpler solution for the job.
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thomas.
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Location: South West (Pa.)
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| Posted: Tue Oct 24, 2017 5:11 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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I replaced my brushes in my 6v generator a while back while the engine was out. I would have to push down manually on the brushes to shut the gen. light off now and then. It isn't that it's a difficult job. It's just tough to reach inside to loosen the screws and such. Even with generator out. It is real easy to drop something and lose. With engine installed, top brush might not be too tough to do. The bottom one's the tricky one. This is a current photo of my engine with the (2 years old) new top brush visible.
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jessousa
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Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Tue Oct 24, 2017 8:18 am Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| thomas. wrote: |
| I replaced my brushes in my 6v generator a while back while the engine was out. I would have to push down manually on the brushes to shut the gen. light off now and then. It isn't that it's a difficult job. It's just tough to reach inside to loosen the screws and such. Even with generator out. It is real easy to drop something and lose. With engine installed, top brush might not be too tough to do. The bottom one's the tricky one. This is a current photo of my engine with the (2 years old) new top brush |
Thanks you for the explanation but my generator is different. It's a thin slot. You can't remove the brushes that way because they don't fit the slot.
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flyboy161
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jessousa
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Joined: October 13, 2017
Posts: 64
Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Tue Oct 24, 2017 12:43 pm Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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| flyboy161 wrote: |
| I’d say easier to do out of the car. But check the generator first with the procedure I gave you above. |
I tested the generator and it spins ok. Despite that I'm thinking about removing it to clean all that crap inside and I also have to remove the generator stand due to an oil leak at its base.
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EVfun
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| Posted: Tue Oct 24, 2017 2:10 pm Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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Generators rely on the regulator to limit current. If you look at the internal schematic of one you will see the relays have fat low turns windings around them in addition to the many turn fine windings. The low turn fat windings drop the switching voltage as the current used goes up. Since you have some unknown regulator it is possible it is limiting current too much. I still recommend a driving test with a volt meter connected between a regulator mounting screw and the negative battery post, to insure your drivetrain remains grounded when in motion.
I have not had problems wih the thin slot 6v generator in my '57. The battery stays charged fine, even when driving with the headlights on for extended periods of time. My headlights are 55w/60w 6 volt H4 bulbs, so they draw a fair bit more than stock. I think something must be interfering with charging on your car.
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| Wildthings wrote: |
| As a general rule, cheap parts are the most expensive parts you can buy. |
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flyboy161
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jessousa
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Location: Coimbra-Portugal
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| Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 1:12 pm Post subject: Re: Beetle 1962 charging or power consumption issue? |
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Yesterday removed the generator and it is a mess. Wires not isolated, short circuiting and my decision is made. Already ordered a new one. I guess I'll have it on tuesday. Until then can't do anything more. Meanwhile verified that the generator stand didn't have any gaskets, only the metal oil deflector. Also cleaned carburettor.
About the regulator it's really a 6 volt. It's made in Brazil.
I hope to finish the job next week and then I'll keep you posted.
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