As a veteran owner of used vehicles, I am more than a little used to encountering automotive problems. When my Ford's charging system idiot light began to flash at low RPMs, I knew I had a serious problem coming my way. When it picked up to doing it on a regular basis, I realized that the problem had arrived, and unless I wanted to be buying a pair of deep-cycle batteries, I should find a solution, probably in the form of an alternator replacement. After doing a little research, I decided to install a later-model Ford alternator.

Today, parallel gasoline-hybrids are often touted as a cleaner, greener alternative despite the simple fact that avoiding purchasing a new car and sticking with your old one saves more energy and environmental impact in almost all cases. Rather than using the new technology to simplify the vehicle, hybrids are more complicated than their predecessors, and the results are not positive. The added weight of the electrical system means that the vehicle is either unusually heavy, or unusually expensive due to the necessity of balancing weight and crash safety. And the hybrid power system, most especially the batteries, comes at a substantial cost premium as well as substantially increasing environmental impact.