Been there. Done that. Lost an alternator coming back from a 2 hour trip at night on a Sunday. Headlights and heat were sucking the batteries down fast. Started driving with the lights off (very dangerous - don't recommend it), turning them on only when other vehicles were in range. Kept pushing for home. No stores or help were within range. It eventually got to the point where the dash lit up like a Christmas tree, with all the bulbs dim, and barely visible. I knew then, that I was going to have to ditch the truck. I had a hotel in mind, so it was a race against time. Speed doesn't affect the battery consumption on our trucks, so I was doing 70 under a new moon, on a 2 lane highway (rt. 322 up near Halifax, for you PA types that know the area) with no street lights and no illimunation of any kind. I was afraid to use the brake for fear that the brake lights would kill the remaining millivolts that I must have been running on. I used the parking brake to slow for the turn into the hotel. After securing a room, I put my foot on the service brake. Sure enough, it shut down cold. I cycled the key. No injection pump click. The solenoid had been held in place by a voltage so low I can only estimate it to be in the below 3 volt range. Not near enough to suck the plunger in or overcome the spring, but enough to hold it in place. I explained to my boys how a knowledge of electricity, batteries, power consumption and a complete knowledge of the truck allowed them to be comfortably ensconced in a nice warm bed, instead of walking along a dark road late at night in search of safety and a place to rest. Knowledge is power! They could clearly see what seperates us from "average people" who would have broke down many minutes before and would be sitting there waiting for triple A. Waiting for somebody who is not an "average person" to come and rescue them. The IP is in fact the LAST thing electrically that will stop working on your truck! By design, or unintentionally, it is genious. If you had to, I think you could string together a few flashlight batteries to keep it going. Not having a manual tranny though, really sucks in these kinds of situations. No drift start capability. The hotel, as luck would have it, was right next to a full service gas station, that stocked batteries. I bought 1 new one, fully charged, to make it home on. In daylight, I had plenty of juice for the one hour trip.
...We drive the truck alot, and every time we stop and started the truck, same thing Ok back to square one...so much for being excited of curing the problem.
....SO this is all it needed....some extra lubrication in the fuel
