Amped Up

Rebuilding a 1963-’68 Alternator and Adding a Solid State Regulator

- Ron Ceridono

When Chevrolet introduced the redesigned Corvette in 1963 one of the new features was the Delcotron alternator that replaced the venerable generator. Dubbed the 10 DN, the externally regulated Delcotron was GM’s new charger of choice through 1968, when the internally regulated alternator was introduced.

In operation, alternators and generators do the same job, they convert mechanical energy into electricity to keep the battery charged. They do it differently but both rely on the relationship between electricity and magnetism. When electricity is flowing through a wire, there is a small magnetic field generated around the wire, and when a wire moves through a magnetic field, a small amount of current, or electricity, is generated in the wire. Creating electricity is simple a matter of moving one past the other continuously. A generator does it by moving a bundle of wire loops, called an armature, inside a fixed magnetic field. An alternator spins a rotor, or a series of electromagnets, inside a stator made up of multiple wire loops. The voltage regulator controls the strength of the magnetic field, thereby controlling the output of the alternator.