I brought my car into my usual acura dealer the other day regarding the whistling sound from my engine. And the technician told me its the alternator, however, he said he will replace the alternator when my warranty tranny is in, so that i don't have to come twice.

Two days later, my car just died on me on the road while waiting
for the light. I brought my car into another dealer which is near my house.

After their check up, they called me up and told me that i need a new battery and alternator, and it will cost me 450 dollar. So i asked him "howcome ?" So he said he will call me back cozi might be able to walk away without paying.

Few min later, he called me back, and told me the alternator is under warranty(OBVIOUSLY i have lots of wrranty left), but the battery is not, and will cost me 125 dollar.

What i do'nt understand is howcome the first dealer i went to(the best dealer in toronto), did not mention anything about a battery problem casued the alternator, and now the second dealer(the worst reputation dealer in toronto) thinks i need a new battery. Mind you my car is only about 34k miles.

So do you guys htink i need to replace the battery ? as of now, i told them i will choose not to replace the battery. suggestions ?

 

the ALTERNATOR will drain the battery - absolutely, but the battery will not kill the alternator!!!! If you have afulty alterantor, get it changed quickly! Do not wait because you will spend more $$$ in the long run!!!! Good luck!

 

Thank you for your reply Casper, YES, the alternator will be replaced under warranty right now.

So you don't think i need to replace my battery then ?

 

If the car died on you while driving then it is most certainly the alternator, the battery has nothing to do with it. Tell them to test the battery to see how many volts are being discharged. But don't spend $125 for a battery, that's outrageous!!!

 

go to walmart and get a battery for $40.

 

no problem on the re[ly.. what we are here for... if your car died.. then yes... buy a new battery... evenm if there is a charge in it still... it was shocked and probably will not retain a full charge anymore... besides, I can assume taht you never changed your battery since your purchase of the car... you can get a battery from $50 - $100 depending on what you want.... I have a $125 GOLD Battery to run my car with system etc... so good luck!

 

Well, So i declined on replacing the battery, and went pick up my car. Everything was fine, my battery was running great, the indicator showed a very nice GREEN colour, means my battery is still going strong. i truly tihnk they just want to make some money by asking me to replace the battery because their reason was that my battery fried one of the dials in the alternator. I think thats totally BS.

For those of you who are concrened about my battery being drained and dying, the good part of the story is my alternator started acting up weird like 3 days ago, and according to the indicator, its still one healthy battery

So when i picked up my car, everythgin was fine, car seem quiter and less vibration on the steering. However, the SRS light comes on, so i went back to the dealer.

So guess what the service rep said, he goes.:"oh.. the SRS light comes on because your battery is dead, and not able to sustain the power that SRS system requires." he then goes on about how my battery failed the "load test"

So i told him, why don't you just reset my ECU, because battery really has nothing to do with the SRS light. Everyting else is running fine, no feel of shortage of power. And i told him about the green indicator.. he goes :"oh thats the one place you can check, however, we check many other places and showed that your battery is dead. If you don't believe me, why dont i test it ?"

I go, of coures my battery failed the "load test" because the alternator was dead, and the battery was drained with all the power usage before my car complete stops.

Anyways, another evidence of BS acura Service, Acura of North Toronto is a definitely NO GO no matter what you need to get done !

 

I've got the same problem ( alternator ) right now in my '97 3.0 cl. Just wondering who you think is the best Acura dealer here in Toronto. I agree that North Toronto sucks, but am not happy with Downtown either right now because I had my timing belt done on Tuesday and they were supposed to be listening and diagnosing the "whistle" sound at the same time (the original reason I brought it in for. Any advice on a good mechanic in the area would be very helpful as well as I've read about and experienced very crappy service from the dealers.

 

HOLY CRAP! A week ago my alternator went out on my 97' 3.0...how many of us are having alternater problems?!?!

 

Doug Sogolow here, a new member. I own a starter-alternator rebuilding shop in CT, and I'm a new '99 CL 3.0 owner. I've been at it for 25+ years, have been ASE Certified for 10 years. I do not work on cars (at my business) , only components, so my knowledge of vehicle wiring is limited. Charging/starting systems are my specialty. Onward and upward....firstly, the 'green eye' indicator is a sales gimmick. It shows the condition of one cell and one cell only. If one of the other cells is dead, you'll never know it. Now, on to the load testing of the battery.....if the battery is not fully charged priot to testing, it will automatically test as being bad. Chances of both the alternator AND the battery crapping out at the same time are remote. I haven't looked to see what particular alternators are on CL's other than mine, but I can tell you that my '99 3.0 has a Delco unit that's American as apple pie. This unit is identical to what you'd find on any later model GM vehicle, brackets aside. This particular style, at the risk of getting too technical, has what is called avalanche diodes in the rectifier. These have a finite life span; that is to say that after they've been through 'x' amount of heat cycles, they will fail. When they do, you'll hear what I describe as a howling noise coming from the alternator.
I'm happy to answer all questions regarding this stuff, with one exception....I do not deal with units converted for higher amperage. The engineers that build these things design them to dissipate the heat that they generate at a given output, and my philosophy is that when you make a 180A out of a 105A you have a hard time getting rid of the excess heat generated, thus shortening life. On a 3.0, you are lucky that the alternator is mounted in a pretty good spot where it gets some air flow.

Doug