Crappy parts store voltage regulators

7dart0 said

Got 2 different regulators from advance auto and they kept over charging at 15.6v. I found and old wells regulator that says made in USA in the bottom of my spare parts drawer, sanded the edges for good ground threw it in and now car charges at a steady 14.3v.

The kicker is advance wont return it for my money back only exchange for another because it's an electrical part.

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It definately seems to be a more common problem.
If you've checked the regulation voltage at the regulator (in other words its not due to voltage drop in the system) it has to be internal to the VR.
I *think* some have a dual setpoint where they initially allow more field (higher voltage) based on time or internal termperature. Saw this on the specs for some Delco SI regulators. Haven't found good info for current production versions of our regulators.
Had this problem with SMP's VR-128 that @slantsixdan used to recomend.
Thought maybe it was caused by using a revised squareback that might have a higher field current draw than the VR was designed for.
Contacted SMP's tech, and the only tech info he had access to was dimensions. :rolleyes:
So far, the new one is working with a regular squareback, but got an FBO VR (3 year guarentee FWIW) as a backup regulator. This is for those of us with pre-70 field wiring. Time will tell.