ammeter charging

[65BLUBIRD]

I got in the 65 and wouldn't start. Put the trickle charger on it overnight and the light never came on showing the battery as charged. Flicked the switch to full charge and indicator light came on as battery charged and car started up. While idle ammeter is in the middle, when driving it is pegged at C until I back off the gas. Battery was 5 years old, so replaced that. Store said no longer holding charge. Still same story with the ammeter though.

Before all this there was some bounce in the ammeter but not much. I am wondering whether to get the alternator tested or I read an earlier post about replacing alternator regulator. Mine appears to be on the front drivers side of the car. I thought it was in front of the battery but I believe that is the starter relay. Changed out regulator and ammeter is working properly. Previous posts helped quite a bit and referring to shop manual helped in parts identification.

[65BLUBIRD]

Old regulator is a cool looking piece of electro/mechanical engineering. Saved it. I am sure there is away to repair it by cleaning or filing points. Any suggestions?

[65 special bird]

I had a problem with the gauge in my 65. Once I opened it up found it was no longer attatched by the 2 screws it was just laying there. I replaced it with a new set of mecanical gauges from sun pro as well as all the others so to match. The 2" fit in the bezels with a little rubber hose between them and the bezels inside. I had to attatched the 2 original wires that were on the amp gauge together to power up everything in the car though. Look great. My gauge was bouncing all over the place and sometimes shown no charge even before I replaced the gauge. So I replaced the voltage regulator and that seemed to stop the problem. Then last week end I pulled it out of the garage to do an oil change before I went to a show and after it was very hard starting. When it did it wouldn't stay running long . Took along time cranking before it would start again and again stalled out within a couple of minutes. After testing I found the wire bring power to the coil had no power so I ran a wire straight to the battery to check to see if that was the problem. The car started right up and ran fine untill I disconnected the wire I ran. After a few times playing around with it suddenly everything was working again except the charge. I had a wireing book so I looked up where the wires go. I found out that both the coil power wire and one of the wires that goes straight to the voltage regulator were connected together at the ignition switch. I traced where the power went and found that that wire did not have any power to the regulator. Since the coil wire and the voltage regulator were on the same line my question was why. I haven't gotten around to do anymore checking but since the problem occured befor I did anything with the gauges and still is happening I think the problem might very well be the connection to one of the main wireing blocks maybe on the fire wall. I will try to see if by running a wire to the battery again to this one voltage regulator wire corrects the problem since I already had the altenator checked and is working properly. Will update when I try this.

[65BLUBIRD]

You really went through the wringer. I am going to guess you already did this but sometimes the easy stuff we overlook...sure your battery is good?

[65 special bird]

No haven't checked that but battery was replaced by the guy I bought it from 5 months ago. It holds a charge so I assuming of course it's ok. If I have time this sunday or so maybe I can get into it more and figure it out. One thing I hate is electrical problems. Alot of other things that I have to do without worrying about a stupid electrical problem if you know what I mean. Found out there are 2 freeze plugs that have been replaced and when this car is hot doesn't idle smoothly as well as the oil preasure drops to about 15-17 pounds. Will increase when I accelerate but concerned about the preasure and why it runs so rough once it's hot. Hope this thing doesn't have a cracked block. It looks like someone did some head work and I replaced the holley carb with an autoline because the holley flooded so many times. One day I hope to get this car running as good as it looks. Or I'll get fed up and sell it off to the highest bidder or part it out. Wanted the special landau just because of the small amount left and love the copper and parchment color combo. The price was right I guess at the time but mistake was I bought it sight unseen. took the guys word for it. wrong thing to do and I knew that just wamted the car.Now I'm stuck with it so have to fix everything and even have to replace the a/c unit ( frozen ). In texas this place sells the upgrade for this car complete package for around 750 bucks plus of course shipping. Anyway sorry to take up your time here blue. I am a talker. Will update when I figure this thing out and thanks. Was going to tell you the bouncing needle on your gauge is usually the voltage regulator but you already figured it out.

[65 special bird]

update on the charging problem. I had replaced the kick panels and when I pushed the fuse kick panel on I had pulled out the connecting wire at the fire wall block. Plugged back in and everything is back to working order

[JChambers685]

Is the car stalling out when the ammeter pegs to the C position? If so, is it fairly random when it happens?

If you haven't replaced the starter relay do so first. It's $15 and when it's going bad it can intermittently kill power to the motor, making you think you have something much more expensive going on.

[65 special bird]

Traced the wires and found that when I replaced the interior kick panel I pushed the wire block plug and unplugged it.