Well, this is my first post and my first Volvo. I own and have owned several GM vehicles, to which I am very partial, but I figured a Volvo 240 would make a nice addition for supreme reliability. I'm already having issues, though...

When I got the car, it had a dead battery. Got a brand new one. It drove fine for about 30 miles, then started sputtering and died. Jumped it off and let my truck charge it for a while, drove a few more miles and it died again. Had the battery charged at the parts store, managed to get it back home. Took the car and had the alternator tested: it was on it's way out. Got a used one that tested perfect at the parts store, installed it with the battery charged probably half way(due to the previously dead alternator), everything ran fine. Drove about 25 miles or so, sputtered and died. Same problem. Both times it happened, the battery light has not come on. I have not had the alternator tested again yet to see if it's shot or not.

What in the world is going on here? Sounds to me like a short in the wiring harness, but where do I even start to look?

Does the battery light come on while the ignition key is in KPIII (the start position)?

It does not. I headed over to volvoforums.com (no hyphen) and found numerous threads about the dash light being out causing it to not charge. I'm replacing that tomorrow to see if it will do anything.

Could that light being out really kill an alternator? Perhaps the original one was dead when I got it.

SOME charging systems depend on the light as part of the control circuitry. check for fusible links on charging cct-make sure the battery is receiving charge, as well as the charge is being produced. An Alternator with no load will prob arc out internally, as the regulator can't hold the output down. >100V is easily produced, which kills the windings.

"Could that light being out really kill an alternator?"

Sure thing. The excitation current for the alt flows through that light.

I pulled the cluster out today, managed to get the bulb out, and noticed the small thin piece of wire that goes between the two contacts on the inside bottom of the light housing(wow, that's a mouthful) is broken in two. I guess that's my culprit. I took a light and it's housing from the far left, where no indicators are, and moved it into the battery light's place, but it did not help. Do all of the bulbs in the cluster need to be fully operational, even if they're actually being used for anything?

My charge light is working backwards!

'89 240. I replaced the alternator with a rebuilt and that may be the problem -- the replacement started out putting out about 13.5 Volts, not great but I figured good enough. Funny thing, though, is that when first started it wouldn't charge until the engine was revved up a bit. I think the battery light was working normally at this point but I'm not sure.

Not my car so I don't know what the light was doing, but after about two weeks the battery ran down. Got a new battery, started it up, and the battery light was NOT on. Checked voltage at the battery and it was about 12.1 -- NOT charging. Went and got another rebuilt alternator. Now, the battery light doesn't come on with the ignition turned to on. When the car is first started, still no battery light, but also not charging. After revving the engine, the battery light comes on and it starts charging. So now, I have 14.1 Volts at the battery, AND the battery light on.

As an aside, I was checking the instrument panel lights and noticed that if I removed the upshift indicator bulb, it wouldn't charge. Might be a completely irrelevant coincidence but thought I'd mention that.

I'm suspecting maybe the rebuilt alternator is wired wrong inside??

Would very much appreciate any ideas. At this point I think I'm going to take this alternator to a different store to be tested and see what they find, see if they'll let me "borrow" another one? I'm kind of screwed because if I get a refund from the first store I'm left without a core to turn in if I get a rebuild somewhere else.

The battery light powers the small red wire which goes to the SMALL terminal on the alternator. The large terminal and wire goes to the battery - make sure these didn't get swapped.

The ground wire from the alternator to the chassis needs to be in good shape also.

i agree with robert240, make sure the small red wire is connected properly to alternator. the red wire on my 245 89 broke and i didn't have any dash lights till i reconnected it. and battery was slowly dying. not certain, but think red wire (exciter) controls alternator output up to certain rpm/speed.

Must get 14.7V to charge battery properly. Do NOT run alternator without a significant load-battery or headlights/similar. or it will overvoltage and burn out. May destroy EMU etc too! The regulator just can't handle the open circuit voltages that are produced (>100V) and it fails. You can also generate internal arc-over in the windings doing this, which destroys them. Generally, the diodes are proof against these voltages, but that depends on the choice of product, as some will not be. Internal shorts from arcovers are best found with an inductive tone device-an auto-eletrician's specialty-takes abt 20 sec to hold it in front of it, and rotate the whole once, listening for a change in tone. Change == fail.. Don't know if unit has to be dismantled or not to test.