http://protege5.ugly.net has everything you wanna know about any 2002-2003 Protege5. Browse through and some of those diagrams will probably explain it. That stuff's over my head, but might be useful to you. Also, you can find answers to a lot of other "general" Protege questions at www.protegefaq.net


Lastly, welcome to the club Mr. Burns. We're glad to have ya here!!
P.S.: GREAT Avatar!!

 

Thanks for the link and the welcome. I had a quick look at the wiring diagram and didn't see anything out of the ordinary.

 

https://www.mazda3club.com/3rd-gen-engine-drivetrain-57/alternator-41700/
Post # 10 is where my info came from.

 

A yeah; thanks for the advice . Although i was not paying attention to the dates on the post which led me into the ,,,now what seems like a witch hunt , for trying to help ! First for voltage spikes, Yes i will concede that it is possible,,likely ,,,NO we have all boosted a car , or gotten a boost , the cables for most of us were put on from post to post ,, which is the wrong way to do it . but no fried pcm, we have all installed a battery,, no fried pcm. we have had parts MiG welded , without the battery disconnected , or the pcm unplugged no fried pcm, The guy said he had a new alternator installed ,, .This would have a new regulator as well !!YES ? So If that did not cover the possible voltage spikes then lets look at the alternator ,,,max 120 amps. Battery 400 to 600 + But no one thinks twice about hitching the cables up on that ,,,VOLTAGE SPIKE!!I have pulled off the ground cable while running to check if the alternator was working at all. (When multimeter was not available), So was i trying to fry the guys pcm ...NO and buy the way Mazda does not have a special wiring for it's charging system ,, it will run if the alternator is OK ,,, I have done it many times . We had a dozen cars on the lot with the wires cut & batteries stolen ,,, jumped from 1 battery (all of them ) & drove them inside ( with no battery in them) I think that would fall in the category for no battery in car but running!!

 

Hard to say really - I've had some people who have worked with cars forever tell me to do the 'no battery' test, while others tell me not to bother.

Seems most people who suggest to do it are older, and thus have more experience on much older cars. By older, I mean my parent-in-laws, and grandparents.

Maybe this technique works better on older cars, but newer cars are more sensitive to the electrical damage because of all of the computers and chips and whatnot in modern cars.

Or maybe lets just agree to disagree - there will always be different opinions on how to do car repairs.

PS. RSX, you should try to type with better punctuation, helps people read the post and make it seem a little more credible.