Hi all,

in urgent need for help, driving home tonight and as I come to a stop my engine stalled. No signs of incoming stall. Though oil can light comes on just before coming to stop. Just completely cuts out and stalls.

Carried out usual checks for engine/trans dipsticks and leaks. All good

found battery to have red marker. Low volt/dead battery Cause for stall? Though unsure of health as don’t have multimeter to test.

No engine crank

had an issue earlier in the week due to empty fuel tank. Could be related?

Much thanks

  • Turned to just be a bad alternator. Though just last weekend, I experienced a similar situation where the engine just stalled out. Had a good battery and 25L of fuel. So I’m trying to forgive out what else it could be now

Update: somehow after about 20min+ rest (off) engine starts up without effort. Driving fine, no abnormalities.

but as soon as I started driving up a hill, began experiencing power loss and sPuttered to a stop.

experiencing same faults as before

That is a similar experience I have had in two 240s. In both cases, I found the problem was that the rubber hose in tank pickup pipe to the in tank fuel pump had perished, letting in air if the tank was half empty. The cars would start after a few minutes and went for a kilometre or less then stopped. If this is the case replace the hose with fuel proof rubber one.

Laurie

When you say "no engine crank" do you mean the starter does not turn the engine over at all when you turn the ignition key to the start position? If so, I'd say get the battery tested #1. Do the headlights, blower fan, wipers etc. work? Do the wipers work but move really slow? Lights work but dim? I mean really, you need to test the battery voltage, but those things could be clues.

4 days later

@carnut222 these very much the symptoms I've experiencing at the moment and I very much believe that it is an electrical issue.

I've tested the battery, and found it to be close to death. Used a battery tester at work for a more in-depth reading. Came up to show 0 charge in the battery with 33% health. Very bad. Charged it up overnight from yesterday. couldn't get a reading afterwards due to surface charge.

git back home and attached it back in to the connectors and it started right away. tested voltage with engine on, worryingly no difference was found. stayed at 12.6v and draining slowly.

figure bad alternator?

also idles rough though evens out after 5min of driving, then reverts back to rough idle at a stop. lack of power to generate consistent spark?

I could just be worn brushes in the alternator that have just started losing connection and the battery can't compensate anymore.

From my experience ?

I haven't found bad bearings on an old Volvo alternator. Most been $200k + km.

If it was quiet before when it was running I wouldn't have thought of doing it.

And now I have spares around that I have picked over time.

Cheers,

Tim.

a month later

@RateatCat what was the resolution in the end? If you post I'll mark it as the solution to this thread.

Turned to just be a bad alternator. Though just last weekend, I experienced a similar situation where the engine just stalled out. Had a good battery and 25L of fuel. So I’m trying to forgive out what else it could be now

Hmm, you'd need to carry a multimeter to check if the battery has low voltage when it dies, but maybe there is another problem with the charging circuit? There might be too much resistance between the alternator output and the battery, e.g. cable damage or corroded at the starter motor terminal? Could explain what killed the previous alternator. Just speculating though.

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