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[ice]

Hi I'm new to this forum and hope that someone can help.
I have a Cherekee 2.5 TD Sport that is overcharging the battery.  A local auto electrical workshop have checked in and believe that the regulator is not in the alternator but in the ECU.  I have therefore been told to take it to my nearest Dealer to get it plugged in to their computer and fixed.  Problem is I live on an off shore Island and it is going to cost £1000+ to ship the car to the nearest Dealer.  Anyone got any idea if there is a way around this. Any suggestion welcome because I don't have the money right now to get it shipped/repaired.

[Mike Pavelin]

The engine controller does control the alternator output, but it is very rare for them to go wrong. What was your original problem?

[ice]

I've had a few problems lately, a few months ago it started to leak water badly, turned out to be a core plug so head had to come off and the core plugs replaced, also renewed gaskets while the head was off.  It always starts great and runs great but the "check engine" and "check gauges" lights came on one day on the way to work and it was overcharging.  The strange thing about it is for about 5 days it overcharged and then it was okay for about a week before it stared again.  The auto electrical workshop put a new alternator on it and it overcharge for a day before settling down for about 10 days.  They assumed the regulator was in the alternator and so they had it for a week and tried another alternator but it still overcharging at the minute.  They admitted they have never come across this before and told me to take it to a Dealer and I would if there was one locally.

[Mike Pavelin]

What year is your Jeep?

[ice]

1998 and it's only done about 44,000 miles

[Mike Pavelin]

I'm just a bit concerned that it may not actually be overcharging. Have you actually had any electrical problems?
The sytem can run at around 14 volts on the gauge if your battery is a bit low on charge, if you have no real electrical symptoms, you really need to get the engine controllers (it has 2, the Jeep one which controls the alternator function is under the hood, then there is a Bosch diesel controller inside the car) scanned for fault codes. The car is OBDII compliant, so any OBDII scanner should be capable of picking up the codes. You can even get them in Halfords now.

[ice]

I have had no electrical problems with the car other than the overcharging.  We have had a tester on the battery and it say the same as the gauge in the car.  When it is started it comes up to 14 then it rises to 16 when you give it the slightest of throttle and then shoots to 19 where it stays unless you turn of the fan, heated back window, lights, etc. and it will fall to 14 again.  It also cooked a battery on the way to the auto electrical workshop.
If I were to take it to get it scanned would they be able to sort the problem out or would it still have to go to a Dealer.

Also it has been suggested that I try putting an alternator on it with built-in regulator to overcome the problem.  Do you think this would work?