I need some help solving a charging problem on my 83 Supra. A little while ago I went to launch the boat and the battery was dead. I wanted to get out on the water so I bought a new battery and swapped them out and boat ran fine but started to crank a little slower towards the end of the day. Next time I cranked it in the drive way before going to the lake and the battery was once again low. My next step was to take the alternator off and take it to a shop to have it tested. The guy at the shop tested it and said it was bad so I told them to rebuild it. To make a long story short the alternator shop screwed me around for almost a month and a half before finally getting my alternator back to me last week. Ran it last week with a fully charged battery and it still wasnt charging! My question is what leads to touch directly on the alternator to test the voltage output of the alternator? I put the voltmeter on the battery terminals and it didnt change from 12.6 wether the boat was running or not. I believe my alternator has an external voltage regulator so I would like to eliminate the alternator as a problem source before I move on to something else. I will post a picture of the alternator connections when I get home today but it has three smaller wires and on larger wire connected to it. Also, my boat has what looks to be an in dash amp meter. It reads from -50 to +50 amps. What should this gauge be reading. Right now it pretty much stays parked at 0.
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