I've been anxiously waiting to take my car for a nice, long ride since I got my Apexi WS2 installed and on friday I got the chance. I was out for about 2 hours and maybe 75 miles.
On my way back home, I took a back road, and I was about 15-20 minutes from home. I made a right and started heading south. A truck in front of me had a nasty smell coming from it, it smelled like spent sparklers from 4th of July, ya know? He turns off a side road, but the smell didn't subside. I was looking around wondering..."Is someone burning trash or what?" After about a half mile or so my battery light comes on. Right away I'm thinking "Damn my alternator is failing." The battery is fairly new and I never replaced my alternator (other than Preventive Maintenance, I've had no reason to). As I'm looking for a road to pull off at, I come to a red light. When it turns green I start to accelerate and the light goes away. I pull over and leave the car idling as I open the hood.
There's smoke coming from the alternator, just a small amount. I shut off the car, and the smoke starts getting worse. Inside the alternator I can see the coils of wire glowing bright orange, like lava. The smoke gets heavier as the alternator gets hotter. In an instance the top of the alternator spontaneously combusts. The flame is no bigger than 2-3 birthday candles. I blow it out. 2-3 seconds later, I slight "whoomph" sound and its burst into flames again. I blow it out again.
At this point the only thing in my head is that video of that kids VW golf GTI where a small fire erupts under the hood, and because they can't extinguish it, the whole car catches fire.
Can you imagine your car completely catching fire before your eyes while you look on helplessly? I absolutely will not let that happen if I can help it.
I blew it out once more, and once again with a "whoomph" it flames up, this time the fire is the size of my hand and my breaths of air are useless. I run to the cup holder where a few sips of melted iced tea were waiting. I quickly dump all of it on the fire. It extinguishes and gushes smoke.
I figured since it had been getting worse even with the car off it must still have voltage from the battery. I tear off the fuse box cover. The battery fuse is held on with screws! The battery terminals are held on with bolts! I try to pull on the battery fuse, gripping it madly with my thumb and forefinger. It was hot, very hot. Every time I tried to pull at it, it burned my fingers. I don't have a wrench or a screwdriver. I pull the back-up fuse out of desperation, and begin looking for a tool. In the trunk I find an unopened bottle of water that I had forgot about. I open it and pour more water on the alternator as I finally begin to get the situation under control.
I consider calling the fire dept. but I don't want more drama, I call my mechanic for a tow-truck company, and call my folks for suggestions.
As I sit down in the drivers seat, and stare at my opened hood, trunk and doors, the smell of "sparklers" is now turning my stomach. The florida midday sun is bearing down on me. That was way too close.
An hour later the tow shows up. He drags me to the closest auto shop. They say they can't get me until Monday. We go 3 miles further to the next one. They say the same thing. But the owner saw the desperation on my face and, with 3 hours until closing, he says what the heck. The tow was $60, the new alt. was $368 installed. Turns out it blew the main fuse (battery fuse) as well, and melted the 'pigtail' that connects to the alternator. It also drained the battery some. Most of the other wires were not damaged badly and could be re-used. What began as a nice ride at 10:30am that morning wound up extending out until 6:00pm, and costing me more than $400.
It would appear that the alternator failed catastrophically, the bearings seized, the thing shorted out, and it got so heated it was relentlessly bursting into flames. Funny it never gave me problems before. Never gave me a warning until that point 2 minutes before I pulled over.
The morale of the story? Well, preventive maintenance will kick your ass if you ignore it, and sometimes you don't get fair warning when something is on it's way out. Oh and keep a bottle of water in your trunk. And some tools...and a cellphone...and...
On my way back home, I took a back road, and I was about 15-20 minutes from home. I made a right and started heading south. A truck in front of me had a nasty smell coming from it, it smelled like spent sparklers from 4th of July, ya know? He turns off a side road, but the smell didn't subside. I was looking around wondering..."Is someone burning trash or what?" After about a half mile or so my battery light comes on. Right away I'm thinking "Damn my alternator is failing." The battery is fairly new and I never replaced my alternator (other than Preventive Maintenance, I've had no reason to). As I'm looking for a road to pull off at, I come to a red light. When it turns green I start to accelerate and the light goes away. I pull over and leave the car idling as I open the hood.
There's smoke coming from the alternator, just a small amount. I shut off the car, and the smoke starts getting worse. Inside the alternator I can see the coils of wire glowing bright orange, like lava. The smoke gets heavier as the alternator gets hotter. In an instance the top of the alternator spontaneously combusts. The flame is no bigger than 2-3 birthday candles. I blow it out. 2-3 seconds later, I slight "whoomph" sound and its burst into flames again. I blow it out again.
At this point the only thing in my head is that video of that kids VW golf GTI where a small fire erupts under the hood, and because they can't extinguish it, the whole car catches fire.
Can you imagine your car completely catching fire before your eyes while you look on helplessly? I absolutely will not let that happen if I can help it.
I blew it out once more, and once again with a "whoomph" it flames up, this time the fire is the size of my hand and my breaths of air are useless. I run to the cup holder where a few sips of melted iced tea were waiting. I quickly dump all of it on the fire. It extinguishes and gushes smoke.
I figured since it had been getting worse even with the car off it must still have voltage from the battery. I tear off the fuse box cover. The battery fuse is held on with screws! The battery terminals are held on with bolts! I try to pull on the battery fuse, gripping it madly with my thumb and forefinger. It was hot, very hot. Every time I tried to pull at it, it burned my fingers. I don't have a wrench or a screwdriver. I pull the back-up fuse out of desperation, and begin looking for a tool. In the trunk I find an unopened bottle of water that I had forgot about. I open it and pour more water on the alternator as I finally begin to get the situation under control.
I consider calling the fire dept. but I don't want more drama, I call my mechanic for a tow-truck company, and call my folks for suggestions.
As I sit down in the drivers seat, and stare at my opened hood, trunk and doors, the smell of "sparklers" is now turning my stomach. The florida midday sun is bearing down on me. That was way too close.
An hour later the tow shows up. He drags me to the closest auto shop. They say they can't get me until Monday. We go 3 miles further to the next one. They say the same thing. But the owner saw the desperation on my face and, with 3 hours until closing, he says what the heck. The tow was $60, the new alt. was $368 installed. Turns out it blew the main fuse (battery fuse) as well, and melted the 'pigtail' that connects to the alternator. It also drained the battery some. Most of the other wires were not damaged badly and could be re-used. What began as a nice ride at 10:30am that morning wound up extending out until 6:00pm, and costing me more than $400.
It would appear that the alternator failed catastrophically, the bearings seized, the thing shorted out, and it got so heated it was relentlessly bursting into flames. Funny it never gave me problems before. Never gave me a warning until that point 2 minutes before I pulled over.
The morale of the story? Well, preventive maintenance will kick your ass if you ignore it, and sometimes you don't get fair warning when something is on it's way out. Oh and keep a bottle of water in your trunk. And some tools...and a cellphone...and...
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