Folks-
Several people have asked if I know of a specific Bosch substitution for
the Lucas alternator in their Spitfires/Midgets/TR-?s/etc.
The short answer is "No."
The longer answer is that while _I_ don't, someone else may, or you may
be able to determine it for yourself by measuring the part you want to
replace and spending an afternoon in a European-car junkyard.
You may even be able to measure your unit and call a few parts places
and ask for likely replacements, or buy the parts guys at Pep Boys a
dozen doughnuts in exchange for letting you look at every alternator on
their shelves.
Bosch alternators are also very popular with Hotrodders, because the
single-wire output makes it easy to "sanitize" the engine compartment.
Most of those guys are devoted to minimum under-hood clutter, and wiring
harnesses and external voltage regulators epitomize under-hood clutter.
As for mounting alternator X in place of alternator (or generator) Y,
well, you may have to get creative. The typical Britcar generator mount
(a piece of bent and punched sheet steel) could certainly be modified to
accept the closer mounting points of an alternator, if a genuine
alternator mount isn't available for that engine. If the new
alternator's mount is narrower than the old one, you can add spacers.
You just have to look and think. Just be sure the pulleys line up.
As for wiring, as far as I know the "hot" wire from the Bosch two-wire
alternator goes straight to the positive side of the battery, and the
ground wire goes straight to the _negative_ground_; on my BMW it just
goes about 3" to the engine block.
In a negative-ground vehicle, the swap should be pretty
straightforward, but on an older, positive-ground car you may have to do
a little extra work. I don't know of any way to reverse the polarity on
these alternators, and, although they are all-rubber-mounted, I don't
think I'd depend on that to make a "hot chassis" isolated mounting work.
Much mo'bettah you should change the rest of the car to negative
ground. Most of the positive-ground-era cars don't have much in the way
of electronics; the lights don't care, the windshield wiper motor
probably won't care, and the switches don't care. About all you'd have
to change is the heater blower motor and the starter, and you may be
able to modify those, I guess, or just trade them for similar units off
a later, negative-ground car.
And, of course, if you swap over to negative ground, you can use a
modern radio ...
Needless to say, if your car's already negative ground, you won't have
to change anything beyond the charging circuit.
-Shel
P.S. To the chap whose letter started "Dear Mr Hall" ... I know you're
just following Miss Manners, but you can call me "Shel" and save the "Mr
Hall" bit for when you meet my father ...
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