Battery light came on - then went off

[njmurvin]

This is mostly secondhand info, so please bear with me . . .

My wife started up her 01 330cic yesterday evening in the parking lot of the school where she works. It had been raining all day - not heavy, but pretty consistent. Anyway, her battery light came on for about 30 seconds and went off. She drove home (25 miles) with lights on and no incident. This morning, she looked at her manual and it said the battery icon means either alternator or fan belt. I didn't look at it so I don't know if it had any other potential causes.

I checked the fan belt and it seemed OK (hard to see under all the shrouds). We started it up this morning in the garage and no battery light. She drove back to work without the battery light or incident.

I'm thinking it might be that something got wet due to the rain. I favor the wait-and-see approach. Should I be more preemptive and have it checked out?

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Neil

 

[wood_e]

Neil,

In most cars the battery light indicated several things. If the voltage drops too low it will come on, if theres a bad ground it will come on, and if the amperage isn't what it should be it may come on.

In this case however I wouldn't worry too much about it. I would monitor it closley. You can test your battery to see if it is good with a multimeter. A little over 12 volts with the engine off is good, with the engine on it should be a little above 14 volts.

I would watch the car for about a week. If nothing bad happens then I wouldn't worry about it