Alternator Upgrade
 

After upgrading the speaker system to MBQuart components, JL 300/4 amp, 10w7v2 powered by a JL 500/1v2 I noticed some dimming from my lights when the volume was up.

Yesterday while driving from Florida to Savannah my battery light came on. Shortly after I lost all power and was left on the side of the road. I'm still doing some diagnostics (everything is closed Sunday in Savannah) but I'm fairly certain my alternator finally bit the dust. My car is a 1995 with 167xxx miles so it's to be expected at this point.

While I'm forced to rip this alternator out and replace it I'd like to upgrade the unit. I've seen a lot of e36ers upgrade from the 80amp alternator to the 140. It seems the main issue when performing this swap is sticking with the same brand (Valeo, Bosch) to prevent the need to replace the pulley as well.

My question is if a 140amp alternator form another e36 is compatible with the m42 engine found in my 318ti or are they only compatible with the inline six engines found on the rest of the e36s.

Might be a ground fault that is a root cause of your cascading problem.
Good luck!

4cyl and 6cyl coupes, sedans and compacts came with 80 amp alternators. Only 6cyl convertibles came with 140 amp, 4cyl convertibles came with 80 amp. A simple realoem search confirms this:
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/partxref....ur=&series=E36

Apparently, up to 9/93, some 318's came with 105 amp alternators:
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...24&hg=12&fg=20

And the pulleys between Bosch and Valeo have no impact on whether the alternator will work or not. Either way, it has to interact with the pulleys on the other components such as the water pump, power steering pump and crank pulley.

I don't think they made a 140 amp alternator that will fit the 4cyl engines. I'm fairly certain that 6cyl alternators will NOT bolt up to the 4cyl engine.

This would certainly be ideal. Unfortunately my car and I are in Savannah, GA and all of my tools are in Annapolis, MD at my parent's house. I'll be going up there for Christmas and bringing them back with me so I can start properly diagnosing the problem.

Thank you (and cooljess76) for the speedy replies.