Topic

Hi everyone and thanks for looking,
One night week before last my son left the road in our TF damaging the offside rear wheel and suspension ,we had her recovered to home and the next day with the aid of a trolley jack and a tow from my old spitfire (not started for 6 months but she rose to the challenge) got her on the drive ,I started her to charge the battery has the hazards had been on for a couple of hours all ok .
Couple of days later took the broken bits off and started her again to try the gears all ok.
A few days later noticed I had left boot lid open and the battery was totally dead due to the boot light I supposed.
I replaced the broken bits, both tie bars, brake disc, trailing arm and of course wheel and tyre and while i was at it replaced the oil and filter.
I tried to charge the battery but my digital charger showed failed battery but after a couple of days is now showing 6v but my charger thinks its a 6v battery which is of course is useless .
Got the bits and did the job and yesterday afternoon got a new battery and a planned trip to Kwik Fit for four wheel tracking .
Did a quick test drive the abs light came on I expected this as I have heard that they can take a few miles to settle down.
At first start up all ok except that i got a sqeal from the alternator belt which doesent usually happen, the alt warning light came on when reving but only sometimes and sometimes with the abs and sometimes at tick over, but there is varying degrees of brightness of both lights and sometimes seem connected sometimes not ! the only constant thing is when the alt light is on the car runs rough and the power steering goes, when the light is off all seems ok
The new battery showed 12 volts engine not running and over 16 at tick over which seemed to me a bit high.
Moved it last night all ok but it was only a few feet, went to it this morning and its totally dead my charger showing 0 volts, charged it for a bit and is now showing 6v but it thinks its a 6v battery, same symptoms as the old battery.
Nothing electrical was damaged and the only thing wiring i moved was the abs sensor when i removed the hub to get a broken bolt out so I am presuming that something has been damaged with the shock of the impact or the abs sensor was damaged and is causing the ecu to have a brain storm but it seems odd that all was ok after the crash and a few day of days after as it started ok, then kills a new battery in less than a day! any thoughts on this would be welcome and as always thanks for any help given thanks Andy

Sound like the diode pack in the alternator is faulty, remove the large fuse in the engine bay, charge the battery and try and start it, if all ok replace fuse and check voltage across battery terminals it should be about 14.5v, maybe the accident shock shook connetions loose.

Thanks for the reply, we have a development, got the battery(showing 12v on my meter) from the Spit put in on the TF and pulled the fuse from the alternator circuit as suggested and went for a spin every thing ran OK came back put the fuse back in and you could here the alternator whine under load and she started to run lumpy and was still showing 12v at the battery while running i pulled the fuse in and out while ticking over and you could here the alternator whine and engine note change so as suggested I am thinking that the alternator is at fault so will check the connections but I cant see me being that lucky and I think a new alternator is required, when iv changed the alternator and battery i will let you know how things have gone on, thanks for looking and thanks to Steve for the suggestion Andy

As the alternator is in the same area as the damage it is possible it was damaged in the accident or during repair.

Yes bang on, the alternator looked OK but the shock of the impact had damaged it .
Lucky for me it was still under warranty,the motor shop I use is great and he is very knowledgeable and I have built up a good relationship with him over the years so we forgot about the crash and he let me exchange the unit and the destroyed new battery under warranty.
So put it all back together had it four wheel tracked and all is well .
PS Just a thought, Dave at the motor shop reckons a late rover 200 track rod ends will do for MGTF rear tie bar ends, I was going to give it a go if my used replacement was no good .
Thanks for looking and all help given Andy

Yes R200 TRE are the same, but you can only buy a control arm as a complete which is stupid.