Alternator Brush Replacement

[Music] welcome to Toyota time with Timmy told Matt John what we are gonna do today is we are gonna pull the alternator on my truck right here we are gonna replace the brushes in the alternator as preventative maintenance I have a longtime mechanic and he was telling me that he's seen a lot of cars and trucks come in at about the 150,000 mile range needing some alternator work and he says usually the brushes are the culprit the brushes are where item on the alternator and a lot of times you could fix your alternator by just replacing the brushes and not getting a whole new one or a remanufactured one since I do a lot of long road trips instead of waiting for my often either and have a problem I'm gonna do some preventative maintenance and try it out any alternator problems from happening there's other ways an alternator could obviously fail but the brushes is a common one so what are we going to use those references for this job well first of all we are going to use the factory service manual it explains in the charging section on page six in this 2000-2004 runner manual that you disconnect the connector from the generator right there you remove the nut disconnect the wire from the generator adjust the the lock nut so you can remove the belt then you remove the pivot bolt and remove the generator the one thing that doesn't mention is that I've been also disconnect the battery so I'm gonna take the negative cable off the battery just so I don't have any problems with sparking electrical so I'm gonna disconnect the battery first and this next page just kind of shows you take off this back cover and then you could see the brush holders right there the brush holder is this little doodad right here it's got these two spring spring mounted brushes a spring mounted they're both spring mounts so these ride along a shaft and over time they wear out kind of really curious how worn down my brushes are when I pull them out looks pretty simple you just got two screws hold it in you remove those two screws and that's it and put it back together there's other things that can fail like the voltage regulator and the diode this is one of our main references and it gives you the torque specs for the pivot bolt which is 38 foot-pounds in the lock nut which is 25 foot-pounds the part number for that brushes is two seven three seven zero seven five zero six zero if I paid twenty three bucks but the list price is twenty seven another reference that I'm going to use is at Toyota four-runner org website Nissan H he did a nice write-up on how to view this repair so I'm gonna use this as a reference to and he explains further than just doing the brushes he talks about the diode and the regular so this again that's the brush kit right there this is the diode kit and this is the IC regulator those are all things that could potentially fail on a alternator but the brushes being the main culprit and so he goes through the whole deal explaining how to do it so pretty nice so I'm gonna follow his tutorial and use the factory service manual to do it first thing we're gonna do is I'm gonna remove the skid plates you're most likely don't have to remove the skid plates to do this but it could be a little easier to see what you're doing by doing it so do whatever works for you and then we're gonna get the alternator [Music] I'm kind of curious of what my current belt tension is so the factory service manual states a new bill will be at 160 plus or minus 20 foot pounds a used belt will be a hundred plus or minus 20 foot pounds they describe a new belt refers a belt which has been used less than five minutes on a running engine what I bought for this it's kind of like what they show them the picture here this burroughs gauge is how accurate it is I don't know but I figured it's gonna be probably a better test than just checking the deflection by you know pushing on the belt that's what I've used in the past just kind of a ballpark amount of deflection usually about like maybe a half an inch of deflection but you're able to move it that much why not get this tool it's a little pricey I think it was a hundred bucks a little more I'll put a link in the description so I'm gonna check what my current belt tension is and see how accurate it is if it's in the right range what you do with this tool is you you push all the way into where this what I don't know what you call this the little catcher make some distance between this part so you can hook the belt and then the belt rests on these things and it gives you the tension lined up you read the tension lined up with this notch on the top right here right on my thumb so whatever it reads that's going to give you tell you where you're at so I'm gonna get it on there I'm gonna depress it hook the bill and with this tool you're gonna get different readings based off the did the distance between a couple different pulleys what you want to do is try to get it as centered as possible and if I go down right here it looks like it's only at about 60 a little more let me just take a second reading just to make sure yep it looks like it's just a little over 60 you can see that in YouTube land it's a little bit above 60 and that's too light it should be at least 80 somewhere around 80 in this white region right here so when I put it all back together I'm going to increase the tension a little bit on the belt so this is how you check the deflection so how much you can move this up and down and the way I understand it about a half-inch you know maybe the 3/4 deflection is about right and you can also do the test where you if you're able to turn the belt all the way around on itself twist it that could also be indicator that it's not tight enough so we're definitely a little bit under tension I could just kind of feel that that it's loose and you might be wondering why is this a big deal well whatever you're driving with that belt if it's too loose it might be slipping on the pulleys and it might not be giving you the right charge like for this alternator that's slipping a little bit you might be losing some charging efficiency with the alternator with a not being tight enough if it's too tight too tight could be bad also because now you're putting extra strain on the bearings and all these pulleys so too tight is also not good either so you want to be right in that sweet spot it doesn't have to be exactly perfect but it's got to be somewhere in that range okay first things first I'm going to disconnect the battery so I'm not having any power running to the truck I got just a little quarter inch drive ratchet with a 10 millimeter I'm just gonna loosen this up and pull it off tuck that in there now I have no power now I'll disconnect the power connector to the alternator which is there I'm gonna disconnect that next I just took this little plastic cover off you just got to get your fingers underneath there and pry on it electrical connection off the alternator so this is n millimeter nut also just like the battery terminal so I'm just going to use this quarter inch ratchet again and loosen it this just slides off it looks like okay that's free there is another little connector right here so this little plastic tab was into the alternator I ended up just kind of yanking on and then bent one of these tabs out it just holds this wire I was able to finally get it out just by kind of tugging on a little bit all right so now get they here off unplug that it might be easier to pull out the starter par partially and then tilt it this connector in the back it's pretty hard to get your hand in there to just squeeze it to pull it out so my idea now is to just get the belt loose get the belt off pull the alternator out and then tilt it to where I can unplug that plug in the back to where I get my hand on it more securely cuz it's just too hard to get back in there so that's gonna be my technique as I'm gonna get the belt off and get the alternator out and then unhook it first thing I'm gonna do I'm just going to loosen up this pivot bolt this one right here a little bit I'll have a fourteen millimeter half-inch drive with the smallest extension and a fourteen millimeter see if I can break this pivot bowl free there we go okay that's loose now I'm gonna get a loosening the nut that holds the adjuster place and then adjust the adjuster to you take tension off the belt so I can remove it next what I'm working on is I'm gonna break free the adjusting lock nut that holds the adjuster in place so put on there good enough better better leverage here now I have to adjust this adjuster right here I'm gonna be backing it off so counterclockwise to get that off think I might use a gear inch for that this nut the lock nut was a twelve millimeter this adjuster is also a twelve millimeter so I'm just using this ratcheting rack made by gearwrench and I'm gonna Jack it off and loosen the belt when I got enough I gotta loosen up where I can pull it pull the belt off the pulley I'm good a little bit more it's almost there all right built this off now we got to take the lock nut off right here and then the next thing I do is pivot bolt out and then I could take the alternator out there so it's definitely got to resistant like it should maybe I could wiggle that thing out this thing appears to be kind of wedged in this bracket so I'm just gonna use this little to pry bar and see if I could break it free got a little bit of movement there we go little extra force here we go I can get at this connection and now I got it out I got the connector off and the alternator's out you can see this is the this isn't original it's a Toyota Denso alternator made in Japan I like it berry feels pretty smooth to me I don't feel any movement it's a good sign okay let's work on taking this back plate off it looks like they're pretty small I'm gonna use my quarter inch drive again what size is that eight millimeter so then break these free I don't know if the cover is gonna slide off without that loosened and then there's a little this tab here so this looks like it's also eight millimeter take this one off yeah it would have prevented it from coming off so we got to make sure that that now will this slide off I think I have to take this off that's a ten little tab egde there we go just spinning it around working it off working the cover off yeah I think it was hanging it up this just this uh see it couldn't get past there that's why so you should take this this part off now if the covers off these are the brushes so we were wondering if this little plastic doodad was part of it and it is this looks like just a couple small Phillips screws this thing will slide right off nope I'm gonna strip end up stripping it okay there we go just try not to strip these little screws there's one loose too let's slide this thing off okay now check out this comparison so okay that's still sprung right there look how much it's worn down so that's right up against the springs you see right I get Springs and we'll measure this just compare it side-by-side look how much that's worn down that's a good maybe three or four millimeters shorter than the new ones so after time if they wear down too far you're not gonna get a good connection and your alternators not going to work properly it's gonna charge subpar or not charge at all let's see down there there's a bunch of brush material but I got some compressed air I could just blow it out with some compressed air so with my measuring tool I think the best way it is to use this side so I got it to where it's just resting up against the brush not pushing the spring in and other side's resting against the plastic and so that's thirteen point seven six millimeters kind of hard to do but maybe closer to thirteen point three millimeters because I think I was pushing on the spring a little bit let's see what the new one is that now nine millimeter so I was right it was about a four millimeter difference of we're definitely a good choice to replace these that's the IC regulator this is the diode kit going back to my alternator regulator diode kit there was a bunch of like old brush material down there so I just took my air compressor and I just blew it out a little bit to clean it up now I'm gonna get the new brushes in so remember this little plastic tab was facing up and you could see that these also have a different level this left side tab is higher than the right side and when you look at the alternator itself it kind of makes a self-explanatory because this connection sits higher than this connection so what I'm gonna do is depress these with the screwdriver slide it in there no so Shawn was finally able to get it he pushed this screwdriver against it and buried them down into their little hole there and then slid it on while he was doing that I was taking this little pick tool you got to get something thin in there to where you can get that bottom brush from hanging up so now we're gonna get the screws back in now we just got to get the cover back on and the other piece back on we're good to go just put everything back on like you take took it off or I cinch these down I'm gonna get this connector back in and you see it's it's got a shape to it flat and round it so you can't really put it in backwards so let's put the nut back on that holds it okay I'm gonna tighten these first I'm just gonna cinch him down a little bit each of the time it's cinching up it's cinching up your one in there about a torque spec I'd only think it said a torque spec for this don't use a lot of force small fastener a little bit of force big fastener more force you know he's gotta just how much you tighten it so just the fact that I'm using this little quarter inch ratchet is not gonna let me get a lot of leverage on these nuts unless I'm the credible whole you know just a cover so anyways now I'm gonna tighten this thing back on okay that's tight so this thing is ready to go back in this thing is gonna fight me getting back into that bracket where this slides in right here but that's probably gonna be the hardest part on I'm guessing so I'm gonna get the alternator down in there first may be resting right there on that adjustment bracket it's resting on that bracket and then I'm just gonna plug this one in was it in there there I felt it click and it's in there securely now I'm gonna try to work this thing into the bracket like I thought it's gonna be a I'm gonna see if I can something like a pry up against to work that thing in place well that's going in there I'm just working it back and forth I'm working it back and forth and pushing with my thumb that's got to be pretty close not there though one thing to say about getting this alternator back into where you can get this pivot bolt lined up like we finally did it's a pain in the ass there's no other way to say it pain in the ass so he came up with getting this long breaker bar as low as possible on here and I tapped on it with my plastic mallet and was able to tap it in place the final adjustments how we did it this is a pretty invaluable tool it's a little telescoping mirror with a light you can't really get your eye in there to see where you need to adjust it to line up the alternator with this bracket so I used the little mirror to kind of see where where I needed adjust it to get it to line up because it's got all must be perfect to get that bolt down so then I would take a look and then move it a little bit with my hands or with a pry bar finally got the damn thing lined up so with this job I think this is going to be the hardest part for any of you doing this repair is getting this pivot bolt lined back up but we finally got it thank God now I'm just gonna get the belt back in place so you just you know push it as far as it'll go basically it bottoms out on the on the dipstick and then now we're gonna get the adjuster back in place and tighten it down so we're getting this adjuster back in its width slide and their dance down there we go okay just turn this with my hand a little bit we did uplink loosen it more than it had to be okay I'm getting the adjustment nut back on I'm not tight just kind of finger tight now I'm gonna tighten the adjuster which is here until I get the right tension for the bill now I'm underneath the truck while Shawn filming from up above you might find you it's gonna be easier for you for doing up above but we're just doing this it makes it easier for in different places to film I'm feeling some tension there now see we're that's pretty close I'm gonna give it a couple more turns and then check it with my pitch engagement so it's currently showing about 65 so I want to bring it up to about 80 so I'm gonna tighten this thing a little more I've now got it to write about 80 which according to the OTC stool is right up kind in the middle of the good range before mine was closer to 60 so I've increased my belt tension by about 20 pounds the next thing I'm doing is I'm torquing this lock nut for the alternator adjuster to 25 foot-pounds okay that's a 25 foot-pounds okay the last thing we're going to tighten is the pivot bolt and the pivot ball is 38 foot-pounds that's it 38 foot pounds so we got to get the electrical connection back on as the last step so remember you got this little plastic tab push it into the hole that it was before then slide this connector over and then grab the nut but that was a 10 millimeter no torque spec for this just cinch it up snug and that's nub and we got to put our plastic protector back so this just should snap right in place and over the top like so and that's it well reconnect now our mega battery terminal ten millimeter again and that's secure is we're gonna start it and using my multimeter I'm gonna see what kind of charging I'm getting so I got this digital multimeter I've got it set to the 20 volt mark you basically put the setting - that's close to the value you want so since I know the battery and the alternator are not going to be showing a value any much higher than 14 volts or somewhere around there I put it on 2200 I wouldn't it get as accurate of a measurement from the tool so let's just see what my battery's doing right now so I put one probe on who doesn't matter which one put it on the other one and right now it's showing that my battery is at about twelve point eight volts which is good now I'll start the engine we'll hook it up honestly but what the charging system is doing okay engine is running let's see what the target isn't doing well right now charging at 14.3 volts so that's good so you know we're charging charging about fourteen point three volts well that's good it was a little bit of a struggle especially getting that alternator back into that bracket but luckily had Sean around he figured out a good way to tap that thing in place and get it close and then I used that little handy telescoping mirror with the light to kind of be able to look into the hole to see how well it was lining up and to figure out how to adjust it enough to where I can get the full you definitely don't want to get the both in there and then start pounding on that bolt you're gonna mess up your threads that's not the smart way to go you know take the extra time to just shimmy that thing or whatever way you can if you're struggling I suggest highly you can get those little mirrors that like at Sears or maybe even other auto parts stores will sell those things real handy so I hope you learned something today this is definitely a worthwhile thing to do as preventative maintenance rather than waiting for you to get on a trip maybe 500 miles away from your home and now you got a charging issue and you got to take it to a shop and maybe you don't have the right tools or whatever now you're paying some jamoke and bfv to fix your truck for you when you could have prevented this problem so brushes wear out like we just showed you in this video do yourself a favor if you're approaching 150 thousand miles or if you even have more and you don't really know the history of your alternator pull the alternator out do what we did replace the brushes give your alternator some more life so thanks for watching I'm Timmy the tool man that is Sean and we are out thanks for watching one thing that I didn't cover before that I'm gonna cover now is that this shows measuring the brushes telling you what the standard exposed length which is nine and a half which is pretty much what my new ones are at because measuring what's left of the old ones it's about five to five and a half millimeters left and remember earlier in the video we showed that there was a difference of around four millimeters from the new to the old it says the normal standard exposed length is nine and a half and a half so mine's near nine and a half the brand-new ones they say the minimum exposed length is 1.5 millimeters coming out to measuring this it's about five on one end a little over five and then the other brush on the opposite side was about five and a half so they're actually wore a little unevenly but pretty close so apparently I had about three and a half millimeters left before I would have mandatorily had to replace it but I'm glad that I did catch it early how many more miles or how many more hours of operation the engine would have lasted with the three and a half millimeters no clue anyways it's not that hard of repair getting the alternator back into the bracket was kind of a fight but we finally got it but the actual replacing of the brushes is pretty darn easy you know pretty simple I highly recommend doing this on your truck if you have you know 150,000 miles or more go ahead and replace the brushes so you know when you get on a road trip if at the very least you know your alternators not going to fail because of worn brushes good preventative maintenance in my opinion you want to just wait till you have a alternator failure well then go right ahead anyways bla bla bla

Channel: Timmy The Toolman

Views: 56,198

Rating: 4.7086091 out of 5

Keywords: Toyota, Toyota 4runner, 3rd Gen Toyota 4runner, Alternator, Alternator Brushes, Alternator Brush Replacement, Vehicle Charging System, Vehicle Charging Issues, Fixing Your Alternator, Charging Problems, Alternator Repair

Id: 71_kBhg6_-A

Length: 29min 1sec (1741 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 31 2016