d16y8 civic alternator

[paps02]

this is a shoutout to any honda mechanics or autoelectricians. i need to know what power output on the standard alternator in my 96 civic would be!! or, if you don't know that. what would you recomend be the biggest alternator i could use without cooking the battery?? 80 amp, 100amp, 160amp??

the alternator i have at the moment is a mitsubishi-ahga24

i tried calling honda - they dont know.

searched the internet - cant find anything..

[krogoth]

we need more info

just to clarify a thing or two

alternators produce current, measured in amps

not power

the power output depends directly on the alternator though, as the battery voltage doesnt change, fixed at 12 volts

now, tell us y u need a larger alternator?

and even if u did get a larger alternator, u can simply buy a more suitable battery that can cope with a larger current

but if u want to know the most powerful alternator u can chuck on with ur current battery, well, thats a hard question

it depends on the charge/dis-charge cycle of the battery among other things, i dont know much about this, but i guess, if u only increase the current marginally, the battery should be fine, if anything it should run better, but i dont know how much current u can stick through it before problems start

[paps02]

but my sound system is still going to drain my battery if the alternator isn't feeding it enough...

i want to know the amp output of the alternator that is listed in my original post..
what more information u after?

[krogoth]

sound system

wats in the sound system?

i cant tell u, and since this is to do with sound, its in the rong section

u shooda put it in the audio video section

and go use the search option, search the audio video forum, im sure this has been covered before

u can get a better alternator, as long as its nothing extreme without worrying about ur battery, and like i said before

get a new alternator and/or new battery

[trism]

krogoth, youre on teh track, but a bit wrong.

the nominal voltage for a battery is 12v. when the car is running at idle, it will be around 13.8v and at higher revs, it will be around 14.4v

the amount of current produced by the alt will affect how quickly the battery charges, and depends on the size of your batt.

a small batt only needs a small alt.

if you upgrade to a bigger battery, for whatever reasons, like a sound system, you can upgrade to a bigger alt, to help charge the bigger batt.

the size of the alt will also affect the float voltage of the batt when the car is running

edit: with a stereo, the first thing you should upgrade is the battery.

i was running like, nearly 3000 wrms, thru the stock alternator, but i had a nice big battery, so it was sweet.

[krogoth]

^good post

[EK1.6LCIV]

Go on the Stinger website and email one of their reps, when I was building my system up yrs ago they steered me in the right direction. You will need a good quality one and they build some of the best, not cheap tho, but cheaper than frying out expensive equipment

[paps02]

sound system

wats in the sound system?

i cant tell u, and since this is to do with sound, its in the rong section

u shooda put it in the audio video section

and go use the search option, search the audio video forum, im sure this has been covered before

u can get a better alternator, as long as its nothing extreme without worrying about ur battery, and like i said before

get a new alternator and/or new battery

this is about my alternator not my sound system.

also... ek1.6civ do you have the website for stinger?

[trism]

http://stingerelectronics.com

did you even read my post?

upgrading your alt wont do anything if you have a shit battery.....


why do you need a new one?

[55EXX]

most amps, all good ones, will have voltage protect. so when the voltage drops below a critical level the amp switches to protection and turns off. you have to then turn the acc off and on again to get it to turn back on. so no worries about damage amps.

speaker damage and lights dimming is the worst care scenario but very rare. the biggest down side to low voltage is lower power output from your amps. the down side to that is as big bass notes etc that draw alot of power causes the voltage to drop, due to current (ampere) requirements being higher than that the alt + batteries produce.

So because the amp cannot produce the required power to be true to the notes it clips the top of the sin (~) wave off so it flat lines the top of the sound wave. as the cone moves it cools itself but during these clipped tops of the sound waves the voice coil (where the power runs through) doesn't move and doesn't cool and this is how you fry voice coil and therefore the speaker is ruined, with enough power. this mightn't be the case in your car but is some info on what happens. you can hear this happen and should turn it down. now! don't confuse this with if i get get a bigger alt it will make my stereo louder as the voltage is the same with bigger alts it just that the alt can produce more current to avoid voltage drops. but so can a good battery.

a good battery can dischage power with a higher current to meet needs. a big alt will only be a waste of money and 80 amp is easy enough. bigger alts will only take away enigne speed etc as it is more weight and resistance the engine has to over come.

now as far as power supply to your whole car a great idea is to upgrade the the batt to alt, the batt to ground to 4ga+ cable. even do multiple grounds in the engine bay. eg. strut top rocker cover headlightt bolt gear box etc.

i too had a very large stereo, ps2 ,screens etc runnning on stock alt and a nice deep cycle odyssey battery and i never ever had issues.

now i know all you want to know is what is the output of your existing alt but what we are trying to say is why is a bigger one needed? unless your competing in spl with your engine on cranking at over 3k rpm and 10k wrms you don't need a big alt. stock will do fine. if anything upgrade your battery to a deep cycle optima, odyssey etc they recharge as discharge quicker standard batteries too so better cope with stock alts and high power gear.

goodluck man