M38 charging? FIXED!!!

[Keith]

Well after trouble shooting the gages and not getting any movement out of all 3 gage I decided it must be somthing in the regulator. So Sunday morning I decided to pull the reg out and look under the contactors I pulled the cover off exposing the wires going to the ABCD plug and found #8 & #9 wires were fried in half. So I pulled the ABCD connector off and soldered some new wires in place. Put everything back together and Tadaa!! Ammeter gage is now working and everthing charging correctly.

One Question though, the needle on the ammeter only moves a very small amount from center maybe 1/16 to 1/8 in each direction. Is that normal? because I've never actualy seen one work I don't know whats normal. At least all the charging sytem is working.

Now next Temp gage system and Fuel gage system!

Thanks
Keith

[skyjeep50]

I forgot to disconnect the battery cables when I worked on my M38A1's electrical system, caused a short circuit and also fried the regulator's internal connector. Every thing else was OK and a new voltage regulator solved the problem. If I can find a new ABCD connector I'm sure the regulator will work again - all other connections and wires are OK. I guess the electrical system will find the "weakest link" when shorted. My ammeter did not move much either. Your's may be OK with that much movement. I switched to a volt meter to get a more definate charging status indication. To switch gauges, replace the 4 wire spider harness on the back of the instrument panel with a 5 wire spider and hook up the long lead to the new volt meter.