140A alternator vs. volt boster

[Slow91z]

So...volt booster=good, boost a pump= bad.

Definitely not that simple.

They do different jobs...Volt Booster increases voltage to the whole system at WOT to make EVERYTHING work a little bit better...Boost a pump increases voltage to just the fuel pump for more fuel, but nothing else.

It is obvious to me that lots of people have no idea about the difference between an amp and a volt which leads to the misunderstanding about these products verses just installing a bigger alt.

This isn't going to be exactly accurate, but the only way I can think of to make this clearer.

Think of electricity as water, and your car as a water hose with a nozzle on the end of it...Volts are the pressure in the hose, the higher it is the more output you have from the nozzle (which would equal fuel pump pumping more, ignition spark being stronger, everything working more efficiently)...Amps are the volume of water coming from the hose, if you don't have enough volume then you can't maintain the pressure and it falls (if your alternator doesn't put out enough amps then the voltage will drop).

What Richard was trying to say was a TR with some add ons still has enough amperage to run everything, but with more voltage everything will work that much better...Now if you have more add ons than Richard had on that particular car, or your wiring is in worse shape than Richards, then a stock alternator may not cut it for you.

Now on to failures...Yes if you volt booster goes bad, it will kill your alternator FAST...Just like if your fuel pump goes bad you will kill your headgaskets...My volt booster has been on the car for a long time and the only time I have had a problem is when I was driving and a severe rain storm came and I had to basically drive through a flood...Water got up and into it and my voltage went way high...I noticed because all my lights got bright so I checked the voltage on my scanmaster...Saw it was way high, stopped the car shut it off and let it dry.

This was not a Caspers Volt Booster BTW it was Reds, no idea if you can get water into a Caspers Volt Booster or not never seen one.

 

[Lturbo6]

time to upgrade my wiring

 

[Pronto]

Seems like every couple of years this discussion comes up. Now with the E85 fuel pump discussions this is a hot topic too. Here's a question for Richard Clark if he comes back to the thread; What current alterator have you had the most reliable performance from? There are several new/reman/US/China/"high performance", etc units out there. I would guess pretty much all of the orginals are worn or failing at this point and many of us would like to start with a good reliable part.

 

[Nick Micale]

Seems like every couple of years this discussion comes up. Now with the E85 fuel pump discussions this is a hot topic too. Here's a question for Richard Clark if he comes back to the thread; What current alterator have you had the most reliable performance from? There are several new/reman/US/China/"high performance", etc units out there. I would guess pretty much all of the orginals are worn or failing at this point and many of us would like to start with a good reliable part.

Well, I will give you my experience concerning this subject with many cars, street and strip.

First of all, we have only used the stock factory alt, or a quality reman one. One owner used a Powermaster alt, and that was the only problematic one.

We started with Red's boost activated unit, and then Casper's volt booster. Generally, both units worked well.

In the past few years, we have modified the charging circuit with a diode to give a 14.5 to 15 volt output from just off idle to high RPM. We have years of many data logs showing this and race cars, and many miles on street cars.

So I can see no need for a higher amp alt for normal street driving or race use.

As far as which alt to use, I will stick with the Delco, and have it redone at our local electrical shop when needed.

 

[charlief1]

Would you mind emailing me the info on the diode set up Nick. I'd like to know more about it. It may be what I've been looking for to increase output on the HEI for my car.

 

[Pronto]

Well, I will give you my experience concerning this subject with many cars, street and strip.

First of all, we have only used the stock factory alt, or a quality reman one. One owner used a Powermaster alt, and that was the only problematic one.

We started with Red's boost activated unit, and then Casper's volt booster. Generally, both units worked well.

In the past few years, we have modified the charging circuit with a diode to give a 14.5 to 15 volt output from just off idle to high RPM. We have years of many data logs showing this and race cars, and many miles on street cars.

So I can see no need for a higher amp alt for normal street driving or race use.

As far as which alt to use, I will stick with the Delco, and have it redone at our local electrical shop when needed.

Thanks for that info Nick. If you could forward me that info that charlief1 requested I would appreciate it as well. I know a few people that would be interested to see that.

 

[GNRick]

Or post it here so we all can benefit. Thanks.

 

[TURBOPOWERED68]

Or post it here so we all can benefit. Thanks.

plus 1

 

[Nick Micale]

Or post it here so we all can benefit. Thanks.

I would be glad to do just that, BUT, I cannot?

However I will get the name/number of the part that my wiring expert uses, and also how and where he wires it into the circuit, and post that.

I can do LOTS of things on these cars and even trouble shoot wiring issues, but my guys forbid me to cut or modify any wires, and I am good with that! :biggrin:

 

[Grumpy]

but my guys forbid me to cut or modify any wires, and I am good with that! :biggrin:

smart guys

 

[A2000RICH]

Seems like every couple of years this discussion comes up. Now with the E85 fuel pump discussions this is a hot topic too. Here's a question for Richard Clark if he comes back to the thread; What current alterator have you had the most reliable performance from? There are several new/reman/US/China/"high performance", etc units out there. I would guess pretty much all of the orginals are worn or failing at this point and many of us would like to start with a good reliable part.

i do exactly what Nick does except that i go to my local alternator shop and buy replacement parts and take them back to my shop and put them in myself------i actually have a better testing setup than both local alternator repair shops---------since i have lots of GNs it makes sense to do it that way--------I probably fix one or two a week for visitors to the shop--------a properly rebuilt GM alternator is actually a really good unit and will probably give another couple decades of good service------there are lots of parts on the market that will fit these alternators and some are clearly better than others------for example there are over 20 different regulators that will work in the CS144 unit------numerous stators, rotors and diode bridges etc--------a couple years ago I bought every part that could fit the unit and tested just about every combination to see what worked the best-------if you are interested i can look up the part numbers this weekend (let me know) and you can probably go to your local shop and get them or even request that they put them in---------parts are surprisingly inexpensive and if you really feel the need to upgrade the unit it is a good time to do it since the additional cost is nominal------------as for the bolt boosters all they amount to is the addition of one or two diodes in the regulator sense line to "fool" the regulator to step up the output to a voltage that is equal to the diode voltage drop------easy to do but as far as i am concerned the prepackaged units (Red/caspers etc) are a great idea since they make it easy and reliable and provide for a way to turn the voltage increase off when it is not needed ie part throttle or low boost-------not so important for a race car but actually a good idea for a car that may see a lot of street use especially long trips---------given enough time and relatively high underhood temps a constant 14-15 volts will eventually overcharge a battery and shorten its life--------as for the guy that had a water problem with a volt booster it must have had some sort of damage-------last time i used one Red was using a modified oil pressure sensor to switch his unit on and off------it is impervious to water since it normally resides under the hood in its original application --------Johns is a little fancier and uses a voltage sensor to determine TPS voltage above a certain percent-------and water will not hurt the alternator either since it is designed to be drenched when you drive down the highway in a hard rain...........RC

 

[Blazer406]

IMHO, if the ignition is up to the task and can fire the plugs.... and you have a fuel pump capable of flowing what your engine needs at 12v and then a little cushion......and the wiring getting that power from the alternator to the battery and the rest of the electrical system is up to task.....then I think it only adds to possible things that can go wrong.

Tricking the voltage regulator in the alternator to make it put out more voltage.... the extra effort has to come from somewhere..... and on our cars... comes from the serpentine belt driving the alternator.....and that is driven by the crank.... which takes away from power than can be put to the rear wheels.

But.....if you are getting a voltage drop (falling below 12.5 volts for whatever reason) during a bonsai run..... and you put one of these volt boosters on..... and the voltage stays above 13 volts.... it does more good than harm IMHO.....

However.... using a proper sized alternator and adequate sized wiring, this voltage drop should never happen during a run.... period.

 

[Pronto]

Richard, I don't run a big stereo or alot of power sapping accessories so I'm sure the stock alternator amps or there abouts are fine, especially after seeing your test results. If you can gather the part numbers for the rebuild and foward them to me that would be great! I see the point about running extra volts constantly vs the volt booster triggered by the tps.
My worry about rebuilt units from the typical part stores is since the value of copper has gone up I've hear stories they don't put as many winds of copper wire in the unit. They look all nice and stuff but don't perform like they should.

 

[MNwe4]

Wow, glad I read this post. Lots of good info. So if you are running a boost-a-pump to get 18V to the fuel pump only, would it also be a good idea to run the other volt booster since the boost-a-pump will be taking some voltage away from the rest of the car?

 

[GNRick]

I thought I read where Razor said sometimes these volt boosters interfere with his methanol injection pump....can somebody shed some light on this subject? Also, if you upgrade the alternator, does that make the volt booster obsolete?

 

[Pronto]

There must be some simple way to choke the power to the alky pump so it will only see something like 13.5 volts.

 

[Blazer406]

There must be some simple way to choke the power to the alky pump so it will only see something like 13.5 volts.

IMHO, this is not that big of a deal if you are running a wideband chip or an XFI...... it will pull a little more fuel if the alky pump is pumping a little more. On a normal chip car....no wideband control....it would be overly rich.....which is not near as bad as being overly lean......

 

[TURBOPOWERED68]

There must be some simple way to choke the power to the alky pump so it will only see something like 13.5 volts.

what about an external regulator like the old cars use to have - i think it would work but it would also be another add on and another thing that can fail.

i like complicating things but even i wouldn't go that far.

i do like the idea of tuning for the extra Alky volume instead - i guess logging the Alky pressure/ramp curve before the voltage booster then logging again with the volt booster
then adjusting the ramp up curve/scale to mimic the before booster run????

 

[tonysmach]

IMHO, this is not that big of a deal if you are running a wideband chip or an XFI...... it will pull a little more fuel if the alky pump is pumping a little more. On a normal chip car....no wideband control....it would be overly rich.....which is not near as bad as being overly lean......

Can anyone using XFI, a volt booster and Alky comment on how well it works? I know I had to remove my volt booster afer installing my Alky when I was using a stock ECU and TT chip. I could not get it to run correctly...it was too rich at WOT. Did some reading on the board and solved the problem by removing VB. Now that I have an XFI...maybe it will work?

 

[TURBOPOWERED68]

you probably did - but i must still ask Did you adjust the ramp up curve on the alky system?