All systems failure on car.

[Dragonslayer]

Looking for opinion validation from more experienced auto mechanics.

 

Everything had been fine until yesterday when I cranked the car in 95° heat. It started ok but I noticed a humming noise from the engine compartment that I hadn't heard before. I reach my destination about 10 miles away without any problems. When I left heading to my next stop about 3 miles away I noticed that the charging system indicator light had come on. When I left there it started right up so I headed home in rush hour traffic. I consciously decided to take secondary roads and avoid the interstate. Which at this time of day in Atlanta is pretty much grid locked. About eight miles away other indicator lights started to come on. First the ABS light then the break light indicator. The radio started cutting on and off the then the car barely ran at ten miles an hour. I happened to be close to my office so I limped back to my office and landed in a parking spot before the car died all together.

 

I figured the humming noise was a pre warning that the alternator was about to fail. When it did fail the car ran on battery power as long as it could. When the battery was spent all the electronic systems started to melt down due to low voltage until the car finally died.

 

I'm thinking slap a new alternator in it charge up the battery and I'm good to go. Does that sound about right ? Would that scenario cause any permanent damage? Is there anything else I should be concerned about?

[BlueSky]

I think you are correct and I would proceed as you described. The battery may or may not come back. If it is an old battery, I would replace it too.

[Kybigmac]

Sounds like the alternator to me. I hope it's not too hard to get to,they have a bad tendency to bury them on modern cars! Anyway Good Luck. Glad you made it back to your office,my son lives in Atlanta and I know how the traffic is.

[bongobobny]

Yes, my gut feeling is that with the lower voltage, it finally dropped to a level where the computer was not seeing any right voltages and threw out codes interpreting the lower voltages as failure symptoms. You will probably be good to go with a new alternator and possibly a new battery if needed. You may want to head to Auto Zone or a similar place and have them clear all the error codes now present on your computer...

[slowrollwv]

Did you check the belt? If the Alt. was humming it could have locked up and burnt the belt.

[djh3]

Sounds like an Alt. Sometimes they will make more noise when the volt reg go bad. I guess its the drag on it or something. Just before school let out we had one of the teachers bring in a Toyota suv. We checked it out the first day and charged up her battery so she could drive home. Next day she brought it back for us to change the alt (flat rate was like 3.5 hours) When she brought it back it had a loud whurr. Depending on how old battery is it may have taxed it. You'll find out this winter first cold snap. Probably what went on is it ran as long as voltage was above the required minimum. Then as voltage drops the PCM needs consistent voltage and when it starts to vary It freaks out and starts shutting down non-essential stuff. Radio, a/c fans lights start to blink, dash can flash all sorts of stuff.

[Dragonslayer]

Sounds like an Alt. Sometimes they will make more noise when the volt reg go bad. I guess its the drag on it or something. Just before school let out we had one of the teachers bring in a Toyota suv. We checked it out the first day and charged up her battery so she could drive home. Next day she brought it back for us to change the alt (flat rate was like 3.5 hours) When she brought it back it had a loud whurr. Depending on how old battery is it may have taxed it. You'll find out this winter first cold snap. Probably what went on is it ran as long as voltage was above the required minimum. Then as voltage drops the PCM needs consistent voltage and when it starts to vary It freaks out and starts shutting down non-essential stuff. Radio, a/c fans lights start to blink, dash can flash all sorts of stuff.

 

Yeah EXACTLY that is exactly what it did. Aren't the voltage regulators built into the new alternator now? Or is that something else I need to change out. Where is it on a 2008 Toyota Camry/Solara?

[RDawson]

Yeah EXACTLY that is exactly what it did. Aren't the voltage regulators built into the new alternator now? Or is that something else I need to change out. Where is it on a 2008 Toyota Camry/Solara?

I don't know about Toyota but with some GMs you need to plug a small battery into the aux plug before unhooking the battery cables. It's anti theft for the audio system. Cost my brother $50 at a dealer to reset it after a battery install. Once there's no voltage at the radio it locks out.

[Air Ready Auto]

Hook up a jump pack and start the car. Throw a volt meter on the battery terminals and test the voltage while running. Anything less than 13.5 and you have a bad alternator. You may have frigged up the PCM with the low voltage and it may need to be reflashed (dealership only for newer cars). Sounds like the bearing in the alternator pulley went bad. Good luck.

[Kretz]

Don't know if this is relevant or not but maybe so here goes.

A while back I had the Jeep (Liberty) in for service. They decided to clean the slightly corroded battery terminals. When talking to the service manager & basically querying the cost, "Just to clean the battery terminals" (my words)

He said something along the lines of Ah! but it's not that simple anymore, we have to connect a "false supply" to ensure the vehicle systems never see "no voltage". Otherwise you can lose engine management settings, cause "computer" errors & cause all sorts of problems.

At the time I thought "Yea, so much BS" but maybe not. With modern electronics flash memory etc I wouldn't be surprised if disconnecting the battery could cause "other problems"

[baylensman]

The first thing we used to do with a car in this situation, was to turnoff the radio and the lights then pull the negative cable. ECM will reflash itself from onboard storage, if the flash tune is blank but not if corrupted. When an ECM refresh it self it takes several minutes after the first start to readapt. FORDS do this the best but all cars do it. The ECM takes note of various sensors and adjusts time advance fuel management fan temp kick ons and lottos other factors and established a set of parameters for that vehicle. The timing advance on a car with 80K miles is a degree or two different than one with 5K miles, Same with fuel tables and feed back from downstreamO2 sensors my 137K mile Lincoln is running a bit richer than the GF 2 year old escape with 13K miles.

 

The humming may have been the fan motor going bad, it may have fused itself causing to go to ground. bad ground will throw and ECM out of wack pretty fast.

 

Not sure what your issue is/was I hope you let us know.

[Dragonslayer]

The first thing we used to do with a car in this situation, was to turnoff the radio and the lights then pull the negative cable. ECM will reflash itself from onboard storage, if the flash tune is blank but not if corrupted. When an ECM refresh it self it takes several minutes after the first start to readapt. FORDS do this the best but all cars do it. The ECM takes note of various sensors and adjusts time advance fuel management fan temp kick ons and lottos other factors and established a set of parameters for that vehicle. The timing advance on a car with 80K miles is a degree or two different than one with 5K miles, Same with fuel tables and feed back from downstreamO2 sensors my 137K mile Lincoln is running a bit richer than the GF 2 year old escape with 13K miles.

 

The humming may have been the fan motor going bad, it may have fused itself causing to go to ground. bad ground will throw and ECM out of wack pretty fast.

 

Not sure what your issue is/was I hope you let us know.

Mind blown

Ain't like it was in the old days when unhooking battery was not an issue. Being stuck away from home I removed the battery to recharge so it would be able to return with new alternator. Hope that wasn't a mistake. All I can do now is change alternator hook up recharged battery, cross my fingers and see what happens. I'll let y'all know.

[djh3]

You should be OK. It may run ruff for a little bit relearning and resetting. I have no idea where the alternator is located. They put they wherever they fit best before the engine goes in. We had a buick suv of some sort and we had to disconnect 2 motor mounts to get tilt in engine to clear a frame rail.

[Dragonslayer]

You should be OK. It may run ruff for a little bit relearning and resetting. I have no idea where the alternator is located. They put they wherever they fit best before the engine goes in. We had a buick suv of some sort and we had to disconnect 2 motor mounts to get tilt in engine to clear a frame rail.

 

It didn't look to difficult. The alternator is right on top in right front corner of engine compartment. Generally I believe Toyotas seem to be more mechanic friendly then American made machines. Sorry all you American made only diehards, IMHO. I guess it's ok to say that on a Venture site and not a HD site.

 

Not trying to start a political debate here.

[Dragonslayer]

Finally got back to retrieve the car this morning. After watching a helpful you tube video on the subject alternator went right back in just like described. No real PITA moments. Hooked the battery back up, car started right up all systems went back to normal. The only thing was I lost all the preset channels on the radio and had to set them back up.

 

Thanks to all that responded with your helpful insight. Truth be known I probably could have figured it out but I always feel more confident after running things by the venturerider mechanical think tank. Never been let down so far.

 

THANKS

[djh3]

Glad all worked out. Yea my son has a Scion TC. Its on the 3rd or 4th alternator and its an 05. The car has always had a problem if it sits 3 weeks the battery will be dead as a door-nail. Toyots swapped 2 batteries under warranty. That alt is low down in front. It's a 4cy not to bad a little finagling. Like I said the Venza was a PIA, but we did a corolla or something and it was rite up front.