1929 Durant Tidy Up

I'm with wee-allis on this one but you need an old school auto elec that understands generators not some young bloke who only replaces alternators.
I don' t know where you are situated but Riverlec in Echuca (or somewhere nearby) are very good.

As Wee-allis suggest, get the generator to an auto elec bloke to fix, but he needs to be old school. There is a good one here in in Sydney, might be a bit far away for you, but could at least give hime a call to see what he suggests - Roy's Auto Electrics Kogorah (o two) nine588 seven171

Thanks all. We have spoken to a couple auto electricians and both were in favor for installing an alternator. There reasons were if they are looking at using it daily e.g mail collection etc less headaches will be had. Neither were ‘young’ nor ‘old school’ mid 50’s or so. We did look into having it rebuilt and it’s still on the cards. $700 was the quote given over the phone but there was no guarantee it could be done until they had it and looked at it.

I’m now tied up until next week so can’t get back there until then. I will get some more details off it and come back to you all with some better details. In the meantime I’ll look into the Lucas and other generator regulators. May have to spend some time learning the trade on YouTube. Haha.

A local business has donated an alternator which is great. Apparently the last time it was driven the coil was extremely hot and it was running really rough. Might get one of them ordered also, at worst it can be a spare.

Hello Urchy,
Decide about generator or alternator first, then get the appropriate voltage coil.
There are two types of coils, straight 12 volt or those that work with a ballast resistor for a stronger spark when using starter motor.
If the generator works leave as it is.
David.

3 brush generators were superseded in the late 30's so if it is one of those a suburban old school auto elect needs to be at least 70+, otherwise it is a case of someone who specialises in the vintage movement. That fan belt arrangement is unlikely to be capable of powering a modern alternator even if you could make adequate brackets for it.

A third brush generator only needs a cutout,the third brush can be set in the position needed to keep the battery charged.................Most third brush setups had additional terminals on the ignition switch ,and compensation for lights was done by a different place on the switch......for this there is generally a resistance coil in the ignition switch or behind the dash.

Here is some very good info on adjusting three brush generators from a US Antique car forum.

forums.aaca.org/topic/278462-how-do-i-adjust-the-third-brush/

A '30's Chev has a resistor in line with the generator field which is shorted out by a contact on the headlight switch.
The field is fed by that 3rd brush and goes to earth through that resistor. The generator itself is usually trouble free.
The circuit is actually very basic and easy to troubleshoot. Things only get hairy when you get into later cars with automatic regulators.

Jarrod.

Thanks for the advice. My plans changed at the last minute and won’t be going away so I will head there tomorrow and gather some more info for working this out. Here is a pic of the coil I took a while back. I have found reference to a Lucas B12 coil if that’s the correct info to take off it.



Mammoth, that’s an interesting point you make about the arrangement and if it would operate the alternator appropriately. Not something the auto elec guys I’ve spoken to have mentioned. Do you think gaining sufficient tension would be the issue?

Thanks, Urchy87

If the coil is getting hot, I don't think the problem is in the generator. I suspect the coil or condensor. My 1929 Chev, with North East brand electrics has an easy to replace condensor in the distributor. A 12 volt coil should be easy to find. A Cortina I had years ago would run well when cold but after it had done some driving, the coil got too hot to touch and the motor stopped. A new coil cured the problem. Again, an autoelectrician should be able to check each component and an electrician with minimal car electrics experience probably has the gear to test them as well. (I think)
Also check that that the small wires on the coil are the correct way around.

$700 sounds like far too much to spend on what may not even be the cause of the problem.