wren652•1mo agoProlific Poster

That sound advice from an old timer at NAPA saved me $400 today

I was in the NAPA parking lot this morning swapping out an alternator on a 2012 F-150, and this retiree walks over and says 'check the ground strap first, son.' I almost ignored him, but he looked like he knew what he was talking about. Turns out the negative cable was corroded to hell where it bolts to the block, not the alternator at all. I cleaned it up, reattached it tight, and the truck fired right up. Who else has had a random stranger in an auto parts lot point out something dead simple that saved your butt? Feels like that kind of thing happens less and less now.

2 comments

2 Comments

abbyr961mo ago

Three years ago at an AutoZone in Albuquerque, I watched some guy spend twenty minutes arguing with the clerk that his starter was bad. A random dude walking out just pointed at the starter solenoid wire hanging by a thread. Fixed it in two minutes with a crimp connector. But honestly, I think this happens more than we notice. We just don't remember the boring stories where it was just a loose wire or a bad connection. The ones that stick are the big dramatic saves involving expensive parts.

olivia_webb1mo agoTop Commenter

Walked right into O'Reilly's last spring with what I swore was a dying battery in my old Subaru. Guy with a carbureted truck from the 80s wanders over while I'm grabbing a battery tester and asked if I'd checked the ground strap. Same exact thing @abbyr96, the negative terminal looked fine but the frame side was basically green dust. Two bucks worth of wire and a couple ring terminals later I was good. Makes me wonder how many alternators and starters get swapped for nothing every single day. The real pros always start with the grounds first.