Lights flickering after rebuilt alternator install (FIXED)

[haggarSHO]

So the other day driving around town I had to get a couple of jumps as my car wouldn't crank, I noticed my volts were dropping at idle. So I took it to advanced to get the battery and alternator checked out, they told me alternator.

I took the alternator off and dropped it off to get it rebuilt, picked it up today and installed (I also went and got my battery charged up before installing alternator).

Car cranked right up with no load sat right at 14.1v, turned my brights on, noticed flickering in the dash and dome lights, turned a/c on, at idle my volts were right under 12v with the full load, (I have UDPs) but it was not dropping, when I turn the a/c off it jumps back up to 14.1 and holds.

Lights flicker when I rev it and volts jump to 14. Volt meter needle vibrates.

All connections seem fine, car drives fine, belts seems good and tight, but not too tight. Bad voltage regulator? Should I just drive the car up to where I got it rebuilt and make them fix it?

EDIT: Ended up driving to work this morning, much less flickering after the drive. Volts seem more stable, but still a tad unstable. These things dont have a "break-in" period do they? From what I understand if the voltage meter is bad it's bad. So maybe an unstable connection somewhere got less unstable?

 

[haggarSHO]

Root of all my problems was the battery, it was apparently not holding a charge, which means Autozone lied to me when I dropped it off there to get it charged up.

The battery caused the alternator to overwork and burn up.

New battery is in and the voltage is steady.

 

[SHOdded]

Glad you got it worked out! Between the battery and alternator, trying to find (and fix) the root cause of the problem can be quite a headache.