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MG MGB Technical - Hitachi alternator

A few months ago I bought a Hitachi fork lift alternator on ebay. It was set up as a one wire alternator. Given its compact size and light weight it was touted for an ultralight plane application. It is supposedly rated at 35 amps.

I finally got aroung to replacing my Lucas alternator yesterday. It took a little grinding and cutting to get the alternator to line up for the v belt.

I fired the car up and the indicated voltage immediately settled at 14, rather than the 13.8 with the Lucas. I'm running the small diameter early model crankshaft pulley. The alternator has a slightly larger pulley than the Lucas. I figured it would not produce any juice below 1000 rpm. Wrong - even down to 700 rpm (the slowest my engine will idle) it is holding full voltage, even with the headlights, heater blower and windshield wipers and radio all working. The Lucas at that rpm was not producing any meaningful output.

With the 1 wire system I don't have my red light working any more. It still has the stock plugs in the back. If they are connected perhaps I can find one that will drive my red light.

In short, Cheaper, compact and a little lighter and it works better. In 40 years they apparently have made some technological progress.

Barry
Barry Parkinson

Barry - Nothing wrong with Hitachi alternators. The one in our Mazada truck is the original one and has gone 177,000 miles without any repairs at all and is still as reliable as when the truck was new. Dave
David DuBois

i'll second that vote for Hitachi stuff. My father had a Mazda almost 22 years old and still going well in the electrical dept.The fuel pump was also hitachi which may be of some use to someone further on down tha road.

Cheers , Pete.
Peter Thomas

If you use the Sumari alternator, it bolts right up and the belt alingment is correct.
Leland Bradley

Do you you know the year and model Sumari (sic)
Did you mean Suzuki Samuria ?
RTW
R.T. Whitfield

I know the 78-80 Ford Fiesta (Bosch) alternator is a direct bolt-on installation for most MGBs. I think the MkII and later (68 on) require no modification whatsoever (same plug, mounts the same, etc.) except perhaps a washer or two to line up the belts properly.

I've been running one for several months and am really happy with it. I can't believe how bright my headlamps are now!

Kelly
Kelly Leahy

This thread was discussed between 12/08/2005 and 16/08/2005

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