Cartalk
Welcome to Cartalk! This Circle is your community garage for questions, advice, FAQs, rants, and stories about all things car ownership and car problems—repairs, maintenance, quirks, DIY fixes, auto memes, car reviews, and road trip mishaps. Wrenches welcome, no experience necessary!
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71 Comments
a safer way is to pull the positive cable off the battery when the car is running. if it turns off, alternator is bad.
intelligent folks use a volt meter
The safest way is take a volt meter while the car is running touch red positive side and black lead from meter to negative if it registers more then 12 volts you now know exactly what your alternator is putting out
he's doing it wrong you see the direction of spin well your supposed to place that wrench on before you start it and then put pressure in the opposite direction as hard as you can
wonder how many people dropped the wrench 😂😂
good way to lose a body part
he ain't no redneck
You can’t go by this on all makes of cars.
smart 🤓🦉🇺🇸
Always a great idea to F around with a wrench like that 👍
He must be a Democrat
people that is ignorant,good way to get hurt very very bad
I just stick my tongue to a plug less coil pack
volt meter is like $3-$5 at just about any shop I've been to.
Fake
Lies
just check it with a volt meter.
i always just pull up to a garage door and let the engine idle.turn the headlights on. have someone rev the engine. and watch the headlights on the door. if the lights get brighter at the higher rpms, and dims when it gets back to idle, you need an alternatora
Another idiot that shouldn’t be allowed to touch tools
please nobody do that that is very dangerous there are much better ways that are much safer
The best and smartest way is to take it to any auto parts store. They'll do it for free, so you don't risk damaging other parts and avoid other unnecessary expenses.👍
40 minutes later..... sir , what brings you into the ER? Ah, stupidity and this wrench sticking out of my skull.
or you could put a multimeter on it and test and see if it's putting out juice that would be my simple way to do it less chance of getting your fingers ripped off
Ummm alternators have magnets in them....
literally bout to toss a wrench into the machine! 🤔🤷🤦
does nobody on here have an electrical tester and know how to test for 14 volts
that guy's an idiot don't let him ever touch your car
Why this make me nervous
Damn why would you put the wrench so close to the belt ?
to all my new wanna be mechanics psa do not do this pull the batt cable pos side car dies=bad alt. car stays running=good alt. no risking sticking your wrench into a moving belt system and really tear something up+that trick is not guaranteed to work everytime new cars alot of that stuff is plastic to save weight/money
you can actually do this trick on the back of the alternator. it's a bit safer 😂
just because the (magnetic) rotor is turning, doesn't mean the rectifier bridge is any good.
Hey that’s how I lost this bad boy😂
this is the guy that touches his tongue to a 9 volt battery to see if it's good, and touches tha fan blades to see which way the wind is blowing.
you do that on the back of the alternator
touch the backside not the front😅
what could possibly go wrong?