Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Which one is bad, battery or alternator?

Alternator replacement helpful hints.

1. Put your battery on a good charger while you go to the parts store to get your new alternator. A really good way to "blow" a new alternator is to immediately ask it to begin charging a nearly dead battery.

2. Have the parts store test the new alternator. Especially considering how difficult it is to replace the alternator in a V6 Contour. This does one other thing as well, it determines if the test stand operator knows how to really test your alternator. In other words, if he hooks the new one up the same way, and it also tests bad, either he doesn't know how to test it, or both your alternator and the replacement are bad.

You should be able to watch while both alternators are tested.

HTH

TB