How do you change alternator in 93 Cutlass Supreme?

Answer 1

First disconnect the negative battery terminal and put electrical tape over the terminal to make sure there is no accidental connection. You'll need to remove the serpentine belt guard first. Then use a breaker bar to rotate the tensioner and remove the belt. The belt guard should have the routing diagram on it, but if it doesn't you should draw a detailed diagram of the drive belt routing and which side of the belt faces outward. Since you have to remove the whole belt, you may as well install a new one at this time. Once the belt is off, you'll want to loosen the two bolts on top of the alternator. One should be towards the front of the vehicle, and the other one on the opposite side of the pulley that secures the alt to a mounting bracket. The 3rd bolt is the difficult one. If you can remove the coolant reservoir, this would be easy to get to, but otherwise you have to find a way to get to the 3rd bolt. I stood on the passenger's side of the car and slid my arm in the gap between the firewall and alternator. There is not much room in there, but if you can get a small ratchet (with a [1/2 in.?] socket back there, you should be able to loose the bolt. This is not easy to do, so it's best to come from a different angle. Once you are able to loosen this bolt, take out the other two also and the alt should pull out. At this point, remove the positive charge wire, which should complete removal. (alternatively, take the alternator mount off of the engine block. The three nuts are easy to get to once the belt is out of the way. The whole plate comes off and then you can deal with the alternator) First attach the charge wire to the new alt. (If you're upgrading to get more amps, you may need a larger charge wire or upgraded ground wires near the battery.) To put the alt. back in, you'll want to get the bottom bolt in first, although it can be very difficult to line up initially. Once this is threaded, thread the other two bolts to make sure the part is on straight. When all 3 are threaded, first tighten the bottom bolt, then the side bolt, then the mounting bracket bolt. Use the breaker bar to rotate the tensioner and install the new drive belt. You may need 2 people for this. Release the tensioner and check it to make sure the tension is correct. Also reattach the negative battery terminal. Then reinstall the belt guard and start her up. You may need to turn the engine over twice for this, since the computer would have just been reset. This is a lot of work, and may be best to just pay the $115 or so to do it. But if you enjoy the work, have fun.