My 2004 Sebring doesn't want to run over 2000 rpm's at times, alternator light comes on at times as well

100

Asked by Ron_r5991 Jan 12, 2016 at 09:55 AM about the 2004 Chrysler Sebring Sedan FWD

Question type: Maintenance & Repair

My Daughter has a 2004 Sebring with what I believe is an electrical issue,
It started with the car not wanting to run over 2000 rpm, If you tried that , it
would buck like a rev limiter or a car with fuel issues.On top of that, the
wipers quit working nearly the same time. I discovered a couple of years
ago on my moms Stratus that they have a ground issue down on the left
tower where several wires bolt to the tower. This is apparently comon and
cause several things to quit working like cruise controls, wipers, ect. I cut
the wires off and put a new terminal there and the problems went away, or
so I thought. It went about a week and the car started acting up again, the
wipers are OK, but the motor occasionally still acts up and the alternator
light comes on as well intermittently and ran the batter flat while driving it.
At one point early on it showed a cam sensor error which I replaced,
however that did not help and was probably still a incorrect error. I feel like
this is still a ground issue  but haven't yet found it, any ideas?? This is a 4
door model and so it is Mitsubishi built car.

2 Answers

100

I finally solved the issue, it turned out the alternator was emitting a very small a/c current back on the 12 volt D/C current and was causing the PCM to freak out and cause all kind of problems including the false codes. Once I changed it, I could erase the codes and everything worked fine. Alternators actually work by making a/c current and then rectify it back to D/C current that is how they work however the A/C is normally not present on the current sent to the battery. It wasn't enough you could see it on a volt meter but did show up on a o-scope. You can simply test yours by disconnecting the alternator completely and restarting the car, if it runs good, you then just need to change it. Welcome to new cars and technology I guess!!

8 people found this helpful.

2006 Sebring with similar problem. Had a smooth idle with rev up to about 2200 rpm then throws a bad cam sensor code / check engine light activated. Could clear by r&r batt ground at tower, but as soon as 2200 rpm reached it would repeat. Replaced cam sensor with no improvement. Disconnected alternator- ran fine. Replaced alternator- solved. Thx for the advice!

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