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My old alternator went from normal charging to low charging (maintaining normal battery charge/gauge at 1/3rd mark) within a day before it went dead, causing me to drain the battery. I immediately had a new one installed and it charges normally but randomly dips (once every few nonconsecutive hours) in its charge output, causing momentary dips in RPM and even stalling. Incidentally, the temperature gauge goes dead when this happens, where the radiator fans would kick on and off in relation to the temperature gauge going off.
For those familiar with the electrical setup, would you guess the problem is with the new alternator or maybe a faulty connection or fuse?
After a brief inspection from beneath, it's starting to look like a bad ground or the exciter plug. I say this only because the new alternator charges just fine with the only exception being the sporatic drops. Now when this happens, the temperature gauge goes flat and the radiator fans kick on until the temp gauge comes back. I ordered a new plug and in the meantime I'll inspect the exciter plug more thoroughly.
By the way, where are the pominent grounds near the alternator to check?
Today, the starter would turn but the engine wouldn't crank up until after a few tries, immediately following which is the temp gauge being off and the radiator fans going on until the gauge turns back on (I'm assuming that's a cooling safety protocol from the ECM). Yet, all the rest of the gauges were normal. It's almost like the ignition wasn't being fed by either the alternator or battery and then after it manages to start, power is exclusively cut from the temperature sensor.
After another closer look, I found that the ground wire was set under the new alternator rather than over it and it had some grime on it from the slowly-leaking PS line, though the end tab appeared clean. The pigtail and exciter plugs were taken out and cleaned while also making sure the rest of the grounds looked good. So far, it seems to be running fine, but if the same dipping in output happens then it's got to be the alternator (possibly the voltage regulator), unless there's a relay dedicated to the temp sensor?
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New Alternator Randomly Dips 
