wow, i've had the car for less than a week, and after getting hit on Saturday, yesterday my wife called me from the mall to tell me that my new toy has left her stranded with a dead battery. Of course I assumed she left something on, since it was her first time driving the car. I gave it a jump and drove it home, but on the way home I noticed that instead of charging up, the battery was discharging, and by the time I got home I was getting all sorts of warnings in the DIC, check volts, battery saver mode etc.

Yesterday afternoon I left the battery charging for a few hours, and then took it for a drive. The battery was at 12.5.v when I left the house. after a 5 minute drive, the battery was almost down to 8 as i limped back into the driveway. I repeated the test with the same results after letting the battery charge for about 4 hours. i left the battery on the trickle charger overnight, but haven't done anything this morning.

So it seems like this would be an alternator issue? I dont mind the cost of the alternator, but damn if that doesn't look like a PITA to get to.

sounds like alt. while replacing it its a good time to clean your battery terminals

Weird, everything is normal this morning. I was moving the car to my bigger garage stall to remove the alternator, and I revved the engine in N and saw some movement on the voltmeter. So I decided to take it for a spin. I drove about 15 miles with the volts at 13 or so the whole way. I did turn on all the electrical accessories and the volts dropped to 12 or so, and then back up to 13 when I turned them off. MAybe the overnight trickle charge was the trick? Yesterday I had it on medium charge for a few hours at a time, last night was 14 hours on the slow charge. That or corroded terminals or wires?

Any parts store can hook up and test your battery and alternator for free...

Do they need to be removed from the vehicle? If I take the alternator out, I'm replacing it wether its bad or not.

that sounds more like a loose connection on your alt or battery or ground

you have 2 way of testing an alternator
#1, remove the red cable off the battery after starting the car, and see if the car shuts off or if starts hesitating
#2, put a volt meter on your batter before starting your car, it should read 12~v or so. once you start the car and shes running at idle it should jump up to 14 or little under. my GXP was at 14.2 i think.

Sad to hear you're having such a shitty luck, but to me it sounds more like a loose connection. check all your cables and grounds

I ran the voltmeter on the battery today, showed 12v with vehicle off, and 11.5 with the vehicle on, holding steady. With engine revving showed 11.7. Definitely a bad alternator.

**** man, that sucks!!! did you buy it off a dealer or private?

BAck to the beginning of the thread... The car already got hit? That in itself can cause things to fail. While your checking connections the GXP ground strap from the battery doesn't have a good connection to the body. Always good to sand the paint from under the terminal and use a little dielectric grease. First I've heard of a GXP alternator going, but they Are getting up in years now...