Lots of positives for the B&C, which is good. But, what I take away from this is that a plain jane miscellaneous fifty dollar car alternator is three times as reliable as a four hunnerd dollar Plane Power unit.
Keijidosha! Could you show your wiring scheme for the OVP? Thanks in advance..45 amp ?Denso? 14684 alternator w/ internal regulator and AeroElectric over-voltage crowbar mod purchased Sept 2010. Installed on O-320 with blast tube, VFR panel, incandescent lighting. Flying since 2014, currently has 120 hours. Too young to vote.
Keijidosha! Could you show your wiring scheme for the OVP? Thanks in advance..
It seems to me that most of us on this board look at alternators as a monolithic entity, when really they are an assembly of fairly simple parts.
Plane Power and B&C both start out as Denso alternators. PP makes a mod to the internal reg to have absolute control over field current + adding an overvoltage module, while B&C uses a version similar to what older Chryslers had with an external regulator.
It sure would make this poll more useful if all the people who responded that they had a failure would just disassemble their units and diagnose what actually failed. Maybe we can find a pattern of similarly failed parts and come up with fixes to improve reliability. If you don't know about the inner workings of an alternator, go find someone who does know.
So far, this poll is nothing but a Ford vs. Chevy battle. Let's improve it!
Heinrich
Generic Denso alternator:
Plane Power:
B&C:
Notice how they all pretty much look the same?
This proves that looks can be deceiving.
In all instances where those that I know have returned their PP alternators for repair (there are more than a few) they simply get another unit as a replacement and no description of what had actually failed...
. . .
This looks like an easy field repair and might be an part to consider carrying if your are running a Plane-Power Alternator. Does anyone have experience with this repair?
Jeff Jones
Broomfield Colorado
RV-7A IO-360 A1B6
Well, then according to this poll we would have exactly one B and C alternator to examine but many, many, many, more Plane Power units to look at. CJ
I'm guessing that the B&C, utilizing an external regulator, probably has a different connector that is less troublesome. Be a shame if otherwise perfectly serviceable PP alternators are bad-mouthed because of a bad connector.
The proverbial $0.50 spring.
It's not just the connectors. I checked mine (because I had the benefit of having read DanH's experience), but also when Hartzell got called on my Plane Power they pretty much admitted that I wasn't the only one reporting problems, that one of the major problems reported were broken stators (or something like that), but that also there were repair kits available from ACS (mentioned above) that would address that or a different issue. They weren't sure. In short, there seem to be multiple issues at work and, what was worse, they had no interest in and were completely unwilling to look at, let alone repair mine. That said a lot to me.I'm guessing that the B&C, utilizing an external regulator, probably has a different connector that is less troublesome. Be a shame if otherwise perfectly serviceable PP alternators are bad-mouthed because of a bad connector.
The proverbial $0.50 spring.
I'm guessing that the B&C, utilizing an external regulator, probably has a different connector that is less troublesome. Be a shame if otherwise perfectly serviceable PP alternators are bad-mouthed because of a bad connector.
The proverbial $0.50 spring.
My original Van's 60 amp unit lasted approx. 500 hrs. I have a blast tube. I bought a replacement at Advance Auto about 125 hrs ago. Lifetime warranty. Out the door for $100.
The Van's internal voltage regulator was failing. It was burying the needle on Van's voltmeter. After removing the unit, I also found the bearings to be bad.
This is promising news. And very definitely a change in policy from what I, and apparently a number of others, have previously (and fairly recently) been told by Hartzell.PlanePower 60 amp manufactured in 2012 and flown from 12/13 -- 9/16 for 170ish engine hours. After providing as much info as I could to HET I sent them my alternator, they diagnosed a failed stator and a replacement is on the way.
Could you list a make/model car that has a drop-in replacement for the Plane Power (i.e. internally regulated) so if I ever need to resort to an automotive solution I can get one easily?
Added: There are a ton of will-fit parts. I would not surprised of none of the PP (60A) parts are actually made by Denso.
So I've been a bit unhappy with how my PlanePower alternator has been behaving. For the PC-680 battery to be really happy it needs a charging voltage of about 14.5v, as I understand it. My alternator -had- been putting out 14.0v, as measured by my EFIS. I now notice that in cruise flight I'm only getting 13.9v, and since it is internally regulated there is nothing to be done about it.
At this point my feeling is that my battery is being recharged slowly, and may not ever be making it to a full charge. This seems .. to put it bluntly .. not good.
I'm looking for an opinion.
snip
Opinions? Is it time to pull it out before I DO end up with a hard failure? If I do pull it out, I'm inclined to go the B&C route myself.
You may be just fine. If you search the threads a bit you'll notice that many have reported that their EFIS's read about .3 or .4 volts lower than what the battery is seeing. This is certainly true for me and my Dynon D180 which reads about 0.3V lower than my main bus. Something about diodes in the EFIS or something like that. You should check yours if you haven't already.For the PC-680 battery to be really happy it needs a charging voltage of about 14.5v, as I understand it. My alternator -had- been putting out 14.0v, as measured by my EFIS. I now notice that in cruise flight I'm only getting 13.9v, and since it is internally regulated there is nothing to be done about it.
I have a Plane Power 60 amp Model AL12-EI60/V (PP) it has failed at 85 hours. I purchased a new IO-360 engine from Vans fall of 2013 and started flying June of 2016. The PP came with the engine and has approximately 9 calendar months of flying time. I called PP and I was told the 2 year warranty is from time of purchase and they would not replace it. This is the only company I dealt with that has enforced this policy.
If I was in the building phase, I would not purchase anything from this company. The alternator was out of warranty before my first engine start.