alternator electrical short!?!?
 

So I'm driving and the radio cuts on and off then stayed off. After that my alternator stopped working. Now my radio doesn't turn on at all, car starts fine, but will not continue to run if I pull the jumper cables. Any ideas on where to start?

Should be a fuse in the underhood fuse box that says "alt 80" or something like that, it might be blown.

ok so i checked all the fuses and they are fine. I cleaned the battery terminals and cables, and the connector to the alternator. its working fine now. so im assuming its a bad batter cable? is this likely?

Sure, on an 18-year-old car the battery cables can certainly be corroded. Check all the ends where they're bolted to the battery and to the car. I've seen corrosion where the cable-end-lug is crimped onto the cable itself. I've also heard about the cable corroding in the middle, inside the rubber insulation.

How did the cable ends look before you cleaned them?

they had some green build up on where the cable itself attached to the connector for the battery. the one thing that bugs me is that the car itself stopped running because of no power... can that happen because of a battery connection? it makes me think its an alternator connection.

Yeah, I kinda agree with you on that. But if it keeps running OK now, ???

Funny things can happen with bad ground connections too. Maybe similar corrosion at other electrical connections? Body ground connection to engine? Main power connection to fusebox?

Disconnect battery (-) before doing too much, so you don't get a wrench across to ground.