to janicholson

Jim, you responded to my SMTA electrical problems yesterday and your answer I was kinda able to understand. You said a wire should attach to the load side of
the amp gauge. How do I know which side is the load side. Right now one wire goes to the ignition coil and the electronic ignition, the other wire goes to L
on the voltage regulator. One wire from the amp gauge goes to BAT on the voltage regulator. Can you help me try to figure this out? It does charge well,
even with the lights on. You can look at my previous post about SMTA and your response on the second page. Thank You, Ellis
 
Amp gauge should have a wire from the battery and then the other side is the load side where the ignition should feed from and any other things like lights etc. So one side goes straight to the battery in some way and the other side to every thing else
 
old is on track. A wire (usually 10gauge) goes from the amp gauge to the starter switch, The starter switch is mounted on the starter and has a pull rod attached for starting. There should be no other wires attached there. The other side is the load side and it has several wires attached. One 10 gauge from the Bat terminal on the regulator, one to the light fuse, and one to the ignition switch. Jim
 
On a original SMTA positive ground the wire from starter switch goes to minus side of amp gage. Plus side of gage to Battery terminal on regulator. No other wires attach to the amp gage. Regulator L terminal goes to ignition switch, short wire from same terminal goes to fuse. other wire from fuse goes to light switch to give it power. Only that wire should attach to light switch except wire to lights. Other terminal on ignition switch goes to coil. Again only two wires on one switch terminal. One powering it and other powering fuse holder. Only one wire on other terminal to coil.
 
No D Slater is correctish. Yho knows wuat has been done. Do the lights and ignition attach to the L terminal of the regulator? If so, that connection may be corroded. Jim
 
I am almost positive that is how mine is wired. It is dark here now and I won't go back out to the barn til tomorrow morning. I'll check then. Do you think I could have a bad light switch somehow causing the problem? I know you can tell from my questions I don't know what I am doing. Thanks, Ellis
 
Unlikely to be the issue. The connection where the wire from the L terminal on the Regulator, and the ignition switch connect could be the issue. rust and oxides of copper make weird currents flow. clean up that connection (best guess) Jim
 
I'm not sure if this helps, but its how I rewired Grandpa's SMTA.

Couple of differences to note, this is 12v negative ground and I'm using a 1 wire alternator. I'm also using a weatherpacked relay. But if you ignore where I put the "ON OFF" switch and instead think of the push-pull where the ][ relay contact is, the functionality would be the same.

It took me a long time to understand an ammeter and how it works, all of the current actually flows thru the ammeter. One side is the battery and the other side is both the charging (alt, gen) and discharging loads (lights, ign). So it can measure the flow of charge to the battery or discharge out of the battery.

But in either case the main source of "power" in the dash panel is the side of the ammeter that's not connected to the battery.

 
The "L" terminal on the regulator is where you are supposed to connect all electrical Loads for the tractor. On an SMTA that's ignition and lights.

Electrically, it is also fine to connect them to the "load" side of the ammeter. I often do that during a rewire to simplify things, because it keeps the wires shorter and completely inside the electrical box.

Don't know what electrical problems you are having but hope that helps you understand what's going on a little bit.
 
As typical Professor Jim and myself agree on these things.


The way I describe it is an Ammeter has SUPPLY and LOAD terminals:

SUPPLY SIDE: Theres "typically" only ONE big wire on it that eventually gets to the hot ungrounded battery post often via where the big starter cable attaches to the Input side of a starter switch or solenoid or else direct to the battery.

LOAD SIDE: Theres typically 2 or 3 wires there that lead to,,,,,,, The BAT terminal on a Voltage Regulator or Cutout Relay,,,,,,,,,The big main rear output stud if an alternator is used,,,,,,,,,,,The BAT supply input terminal on a lights or ignition switch HOWEVER if the VR has the 4th LOAD terminal loads like lights and ignition wire there instead of the Ammeter

John T
 
Just for giggles, temporarily attach the wire TO the coil, from the ignition switch straight to the battery, or starter stud, and see if it fires up.
 

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