All lights go dim to bright, bright to dim

Asked by Guru2WKMJ Feb 17, 2024 at 06:36 PM about the 2002 Ford Taurus SE

Question type: Maintenance & Repair

Car died, attached jumper cables & started, removed neg cable & engine died.
Installed a charged battery & eng would stay running. Checked voltage output
and no reading. Replaced alternator(first new alt was bad) & now with lights &
heater on lights go from bright to dim continousley

2 Answers
157,615

James answered 9 months ago

Buy a new, not rebuilt or remanufactured, alternator. You'll have better luck. A rebuilt alternator gets cleaned, only the bad parts replaced, put back together, and sold to you. So it's very common to get a defective one right out of the box. Also, since your battery was completely dead, recharge it or, if it's more than 3 years old, replace it. The alternator is not designed to recharge a completely dead battery. Hope that helps! Jim

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