You need ammeter basics, An ammeter is nothing but a voltage sensing device
that has an internal or external SHUNT or resistor. There is usually a
fusible link hooked into the plus lead of the battery terminal. You want to
splice the ammeter terminals into the wire after the fusible link if the car
has one.
How it works is that when current is being drawn from the battery the shunt
provides a negative voltage for the meter showing discharge, When the
alternator kicks in and starts putting current into the battery, the voltage
supplied to the meter is positive indicating a 'charge'.
Hope this helps.
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-spitfires@autox.team.net
[mailto:owner-spitfires@autox.team.net]On Behalf Of JeffreyLos@aol.com
Sent: Monday, July 10, 2000 3:20 AM
To: spitfires@autox.team.net
Subject: Wiring an ammeter
Hello List:
I could use some advice here. I'm wiring an ammeter into my 72 Spit, and
since electrical is definitely not my strongpoint, I want to run it by the
list just to make sure.
The generic instructions say to "disconnect all wires" to the battery post
of
the (in this case) starter solenoid and splice them into a single #10
stranded wire and run that to one post of the ammeter. Then, run another #10
from the other ammeter post back to the battery post of the starter
solenoid.
In effect, this means splicing in the two brown wires from the alternator,
two other brown wires that serve the lights, and another brown wire that
goes
to the ignition starter switch. Does splicing five wires into one #10 seem
OK? If so, wouldn't it be easier to plug these five wires into some kind of
junction box or other connector(like they are now on the battery post)
instead of splicing them all together? Can the light in the gauge just be
wired back to the lights for the fuel and temperature gauges? Does this
overall approach sound similar to anyone else that has wired an ammeter into
a Spitfire? Thanks for any help on this.
Jeff
Portland, OR.
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