Itinerant Air-Cooled

OK. I was getting ready to start up my engine yesterday and hooked up my freshly charged battery and the big red wire going from my alternator to the starter fried on me instantly. Also, the battery terminals became very hot.

What could possibly cause this? Direct short?

Yeppers. Something is grounding that shouldn't be.

Thank you Rick.

Can that wire be run directly to the battery instead of the starter?

Ryno wrote:
Can that wire be run directly to the battery instead of the starter?

Is it that stupid of a question?

I would make sure the battery cables aren't reversed. It happens to the best of us! What year is your bus? The wires are different on early models. For example, our 71 has an alternator with an internal regulator (not stock).

I once fried an alternator jumping a bus because mine has a RED negative wire to the battery. Stupid. It's still there but I wrote "neg" with a sharpie. I'll not forget now though!

Here's my experience:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=369693

My posting starts a little ways down. But yes, you can put the B+ wire directly to the battery's positive terminal.

AirCooledNut wrote:Here's my experience:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=369693

My posting starts a little ways down. But yes, you can put the B+ wire directly to the battery's positive terminal.

The reason you want to go through the rigamorale of shipping the alternator juice directly to the starter is because the VW engineers wanted the alternator to feed the main juice to the front of the car from that the "junction" of the battery cable/alternator wire/main red wire/heater blower main wire. This is the happiest set-up for cool reliable wires.
Colin

I took the first alternator apart and it's hard to tell where it grounded out and melted. I'm pretty sure that event smoked the solenoid in the starter too, as I had to replace that as well.

The second alternator works just fine, and I ran the B+ to the starter as it should be.