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High Voltage Reading on Dash Guage

wildwood1wildwood1 Member Posts: 1
edited July 2015 in GMC
Have a 2001 Yukon XL. Couple of months ago, voltage meter started bouncing between 12 and 14 volts when sitting idle. Original alternator in vehicle, so it was replaced. After a couple of months of replacing alternator, the battery symbol light up on message center and dash volt meter was ramping from 14 volts to 17-18 volts. Cut car off and restarted. Problem went away for a while. Started happening more frequent and thought there was a bad voltage regulator in the new alternator. So replaced alternator again. Couple of months later, high voltage reading starts up again. What is causing this high voltage to occur?
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Answers

  • jpp75jpp75 Member Posts: 1,535
    Might be a voltage regulator. We had one go bad in a Lincoln a while back but it was built into the alternator so it required an alternator replacement. I think on most other cars the voltage regulator is a separate component.
  • Mr_ShiftrightMr_Shiftright Member Posts: 64,481
    The regulators are built in on this truck, and the alternator is not repairable/serviceable. It might be interesting to test the alternator output with a VOM meter while this spiking is going on.
  • jpp75jpp75 Member Posts: 1,535
    Mr_Shiftright said:

    The regulators are built in on this truck, and the alternator is not repairable/serviceable. It might be interesting to test the alternator output with a VOM meter while this spiking is going on.

    Thanks Mr Shiftright. My next guess was a sending unit, but your test would confirm if that's the issue.
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