well i was coming home one night and my alternator decided to take a ****. so i had no choice but to go to autozone and buy an alternator, and wouldn't you know it all they had was the valuecraft alternators, so i was like well i need one now so i got to get it. that was like wednesday night. so i go to work today (friday) and just as i'm getting off the exit ramp guess what, my alternator stops charging ALREADY!! now i understand autozone's parts are junk, but then they brought these valuecraft that are the most terrible things you can possibly buy. i work at a midas and they use some of the valuecraft stuff and it's complete bs. now i knew i was buying junk but like i said what other choice did i have, i even said to myself i bet this thing lasts about 2 months.. but 2 DAYS later it went. it has a 1 eyar warrenty on it so i got another one but i had to get it at a differnet autozone. if this one goes again too i'm going to see if they will let me trade it in for a better quality one and pay the difference. so just to let you guys know unless you have no other choice don't buy valuecraft ANYTHING!

 

The low budget packaging and wannabe elegant writing they use makes it enough for me to stay away. I once said to myself I'd never buy that junk unless I was in dire straits. Sorry about your misfortune. Get a AC Delco as soon as you can. Just see if you can get your money back for that thing.

 

yeah over the years ive bought many many autozone parts and to tell you the truth about 99% of the time its crap ....but you do get lucky once in a while ....lol

i wont buy alternators, starters and the such from them ....but i dont usually have a problem buying u-joints or waterpumps or gaskets and such from them ....

i feel for ya thou i know exactly what you are going thru i had an 86 olds cutlas calai or however you spell it ...LOL...but it had the same problem the only place i could get an alternator from was autozone and same thing but mine lasted 2 weeks....and it was a royal pain in the a$$ to change....

i did exactly what you are talking about taking it back and getting the better alternator and paying the difference they will do it .....

 

My autozone starter is still kicking...its been 2 years I believe. Cranking a 9.6:1 compression motor.

 

AC Delco even though more expensive, is the best way to go for right now. But even they have loose connections inside (I have had 2 CS144s break loose where the bolted connection goes to the battery")

 

yea well lucky for us the alternators in our cars are 5 minutes. if this one goes i'm going back to autozone and raising holy hell and they will definietly give me a damn better alternator =) lol i got my starter from there over the winter and thats still doing good... my father had bad luck with a starter for a k5 blazer he had to keep replacing the starter and flywheel.

 

I like to use autozone parts, sometimes. Like when my system was eating 2 alternators a year, I would buy a lifetime warranty autozone one, and everytime it burned up, they would replace it, no questions asked. Same for my starter, I know the high compression is gonna kill it, so when it does, its free.

 

yea i'd like it too if it had some kind of quality.. as for lasting 2 days thats alittle bit ridiculous

 

yeah two days is a little bit rediculous to say the least......

id take it in and ask them if they want to put it back on the car for ya.....LMAO

 

lol yea.. i wouldn't trust them doing that though, i don't like anyone working on my car other then me or my dad, dunno why though

 

www.alternatorparts.com

I have both the CS130 Iceberg (140 A) and CS144 (140 A) alternators and both are great. I recommend them. Going a bit bigger than stock will help with those high draw stereos and the subsequent slow turn signal problems.

Ed

 

hm thanks maybe i will buy one of them next time this pos goes on me.

 

I put one of those Iceberg conversion kits on my stock alt. about 5 years ago and it's still going strong, before that the diodes would go out every year or so because of heat build-up.

 

When I finally gave up, I took my original stock alternator to an electric motor shop and the guy built it to the hilt. Never had a chargine problem, or a dependability issue. However, within a week my old battery died and all my headlights blew. after I replaced them, no problems.

 

My 87 Cutlass has the original starter and alternator with around 270,000km on it. I want to wait and see just how long they last. So far the alternator still puts out over 15v and the starter sounds good and spins fast. I won't replace them with anything but AC Delco.

 

yea i wish that more parts stores were open when it happened so i could have gotten a better quality alternator.. i don't feel like changing my alternator on the side of the raod 50 times a year ya know