Hi, I own a mk3 1.6 Zetec and have been having a problem with it for a while now, here’s how it goes,

when I first got it it died within a few days when driving along, took it to the garage, had a bad alternator so got new one put on.
 

car then started to stutter and 3 lights on dash flash up for a second and disappear, happens when accelerating and when changing gear sometimes & also when driving about 60mph. When driving at night headlights dim when accelerating aswell. problem continued for a while so bought a new battery and changed that, fixed for about a day and then started doing it again.

could it be the alternator was faulty from the beginning? My mate who works at the garage fitted it and said it was charging fine when fitted and was no problem. 
 

anyone know what could be going on?
 

 

Hi mate, 

had a very similar problem with my previous car and everything was pointing to the alternator, but it turned out to be the battery. Had that changed and it was then fine. As you have fitted a new alternator AND battery, it should be all good. Is everything plugged and screwed in properly? 

I'd suggest the first thing to do would be to test the charging voltage. This should settle in the range 14V to 14.5V with the engine running above tickover. If possible use the accessory (cigar lighter) socket to monitor the voltage whilst driving (for safety get a passenger to do it) to see if it varies when the engine stutters.

Thanks for the replies, as far as I can tell everything looks good I’m no mechanic though, will try and test voltage tomorrow if I can get my hands on a multimeter from someone 👍🏻

A basic but perfectly usable digital multimeter can be had for about a tenner, e.g. see here. IMHO they are a very worthwhile investment.