What would cause an alternator to fail? - Updated

[BEJinFbk]

Well if looks like I opened a can of worms for myself. Found a thread on Swedespeed which is full of some typical no knowledge speculation, but there is some curious stuff like Volvo changing the alternator supplier from Denso to Bosch and requiring a wiring change kit which I can not find anything about. The parts website talks about a 3 pole and 2 pole connector, but the car in question only uses one of the 3 wires in the connector and it is the middle one called A:1??

https://www.swedespeed.com/threads/s40- ... tby=oldest

Neil.

You may be overcomplicating this 2/3 wire mention in relation to P80’s.
I’m not sure that a SS 2005-2012 S40/V50 section post is a fair comparison.
Volvo was a very different company at that point and with that car.

And I can’t remember ever seeing a P80 charging system with
anything more than a Big post B+ connection and the small lead
that operates the alternator light in the dash.

AFAIK, P80’s only shipped with Bosch self regulated “1 wire” alternators.

[scot850]

The issue is with an 06 V50 T5 AWD manual, and not a P80. The original question was on this forum as there is more traction on this than the P1 and I was looking for general ideas. This morphed to more targeting the issue on the P1.

No issue with P80's or their alternators or charging systems. Fairly simple even for me!!

Thanks though!

Neil.

[abscate]

The fan vanes blow quite a bit of air through it and its heat load isn’t that high. I’m guessing alternators are 90% efficient, so a 100 amp alternator only has a heat load of 120 watts , one bright old light bulb

That’s only 84 watts , Canadian , too.