Very Confused!

I’ll look at ammeter bypass as well?
In my opinion, its totally unneccesary on an otherwise stock electrical system and can lead to problems.
Some years (early 70s) seem to have been more prone to failure due to water leakage and maybe ammeter design. Even Redfish had said he'd not seen problem in the rally dashes.

One thing an ammeter does that a voltmeter can not is show is how much the battery is recharging or discharging.
With a voltmeter the driver can only assume the battery is charging when the voltage is around 14 V.
Conversely, an ammeter can only give clues about the alternator and regulator's performance. If the battery is discharging with the engine running, we know the engine is running on battery power.
So that's why having both a handheld voltmeter and a built in ammeter is most useful.