Battery Light

[shiney]

Just wanted to canvass a few opinions bfore tackling the problem..

My battery ligt is showing up intermittently on my car. Now in the past, these lights have been to show charging failures, ie alternator has gone but thats always a constant light on the dash. Does this ligt also appear when the battery is on its way out on a volvo?

I'm looking to replace the battery anyway, so that's not a problem but I'm just a bit nervous now as I might have an alternator problem too.

Is changing the alternator easy on a volvo and are there various options available? I am goin to be running some heavy loads in the form of an audio amplifier soon, so I was planning on running a larger capacity battery anyway, but I'd appreciate any advice on upgrades for alternators etc too.

Thanks in advance,

Paul

[jp850R]

My light didnt come on wen my batt went mate.

[shiney]

My light didnt come on wen my batt went mate.

Hmm, sounds like an intermittent charger (ie alternator) fault then?
Don't suppose you know how much a replacement is?

I know the standard battery is rather small at 55ah so I was thinking about getting something bigger to fit in the car, like a 72ah one instead, was also a bit worried about the alternator and charging the larger battery, so hence the reasoning in asking about batteries and alternators.

[Vikingxl]

Sounds like an alternator to me as well .Not had this problem with the volvo but had the same symptoms with other cars and its been the alternator

[racer]

Could be a red herring as it's not on a Volvo, but I had this on the race car once. Did it for 3 laps, then I heard something fall out of the engine bay and clatter along the floorpan. Light came on permanently after that.
Turned out the alternator pully had worked loose then finally jumped ship. Might be worth checking before you fork out for a new alternator.
Other one to look at is all your earthing straps. If these start going away you can get similar things happening.

[Vikingxl]

You've reminded me of something else check the wiring from the alternator as well i had a mondeo and the wiring had a split in as it came from the alternator it killed three alternators before they found the problem.It was shorting out when it got wet and then of course the battery just died.