1951 Hudson Hornet 308 Charging System - Details

HoustonHudsonHornet
HoustonHudsonHornet Member
in "How To" - Skills, mechanical and other wise
Alright, so I wanted to document what I did to get my charging system connected and updated.  I was new to this before I did it and gathered information from all over to put it all together.  Hopefully someone new will find this a little easier/central to reference.  I used several posts from this very forum, as well as documents around the web .

Alternator
I've done a couple of alternator swaps in the past, so I just grabbed one I'm familiar with.  I bought a GM style 12SI 78amp alternator from RockAuto.  It was on closeout for $30.  You can get any flavor you want though.  The newer CS series are nice because they have internal fans, but to each his own.  It's internally regulated, so I used one of the plethora of wiring diagrams on the web to wire it up.

Pulley
The alternator came with a smaller width belt pulley.  I asked around on here and found some options.  I got mine from Jegs.  It was a Powermaster 1137 Generator Pulley.

Mounting
This was stressful.  I didn't have any brackets from the generator, so I got the privilege of making them from scratch!  I used some angle iron that I mounted to the block, and then bought a universal alternator mount to bolt to that.  I used some straightedges, clamps, and good ol' eyeballs to line up the pulley.  The adjuster was a bit of an issue here.  The factory adjuster just didn't reach without mounting the alternator in a really weird position.  I suppose I could have gotten an alternator with the tab clocked different, but I didn't know at the time.  What I did was fairly simple.  I took a piece of flat steel, drilled a hole for the existing adjuster bolt on the water pump.  I drilled another hole for the next bolt up on the water pump.  This let me install the steel as a solid, immobile piece.  I drilled a third hole and installed a heim joint adjuster between this new piece and the alternator.  I did have to tap the alternator tab in order to install the bolt.

Here's a good shot of the adjuster system.


If you look close, you can see the mounting bracket on top of the angle iron.


Belt
This took some trial and error.  Since I had a custom setup, I couldn't use the factory belt size, and apparently I suck at measuring for a belt!  I did find that the B/BX series belts fit the pulley width.  Mine ended up being a B38 which is a solid belt.  The BX38 is the one that looks toothed.  I'm not sure if there is a big difference, 20min is long enough to call it good, right?

Wiring
Mine is very basic and crude at the moment.  I have a 10ga from the alternator to the battery, a 14ga from the regulator to KeyOn power, and a 14ga from the regulator to the battery feed (a jumper, essentially).  Aside from the starting system, that is the only thing connected at the moment.  I will eventually loom and wire everything properly, I just haven't made it that far yet.

I hope this helps anyone looking for some info on what can be done.  Obviously this means I'm converting to 12v, but just in case it's not...I'm converting everything to 12v.  

I suck at taking pictures while I'm working.  I get kind of caught up in the task and forget until afterwards.  If anyone wants to see anything specific or has any questions, just let me know!

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