How to Remove Alternator on 10th Gen Honda Accord Without Exhaust Disassembly

hey folks I'm really excited about today's video because I think it's something that's really interesting and potentially pretty useful I don't think a lot of people realize that you can get a replacement set of brushes for your Honda alternator for about ten dollars and replacing the brush assembly is actually a really simple process and can extend the life of your original OEM alternator the tricky part though is getting access to the alternator on these 10th gen Accords the alternators buried down in the back and it's difficult to get it out so I'm going to show you a method in this video that I think is a lot easier especially for a do-it-yourselfers than the method recommended in the Honda service manual so let me show you why it's hard to get the alternator out here the alternator is back in the back of the engine here and here you can see down here this is where the belt goes over the alternator pulley and then this is the alternator itself Honda recommends that you take out the alternator from the back of the engine from the bottom and to do so if you look in here you can see the exhaust pipe so they recommend pulling out the entire um exhaust pipe to get access to it and get room to pull it out so if you live in a salty Rusty area like I do you know that taking apart the exhaust is a pain plus if you don't have a lift it's a pain to work from the bottom so I thought for sure there'd be enough room to get it up through the back left of the engine here and I took off a lot of stuff the shield on the gas line and a bunch of other components this wire harness but I couldn't fit it out this way so today we're going to try a different approach which is to remove the battery and see if we can take it out from the right side of the engine once we get it loose all right so the plan is to take out the battery the battery tray I think we're gonna have to take out the air box to do that so I think we'll have enough room after that to get the alternator through um out through this side of the engine keep the battery out of there just a little clip here for the load sensor you can get that out of the way it's a little plastic nut that just holds the wire harness on there foreign place here and these little uh these bolts just unhooked from the side and take the little insulation boot out and pop the battery out of the way a little tray on the bottom here that comes out okay then down the bottom let me make sure you can see so down on the bottom there's a bolt here and then a bolt over here remove the battery tray come on all right and then uh there's a bracket that holds the PCM here the computer and I think if we just remove that bolt we can slide the battery tray out from underneath it looks like that might be a 10 millimeter yeah okay and then there's electrical connector here that goes to a bracket that goes to the battery tray there's a little tab in the back that you can pull down on and then slide the electrical connector back and then that comes free of the tray oh there's another bolt up for the battery tray the 12 millimeter variety ters in the back that go to the battery tray and so this one just has a little tab that you can lift up on and then pull that off and this one just has the ears I think that's all free in the back there now there's one bolt that's underneath this air box so we're gonna have to take that off this electrical connector also mounts to the battery tray it's just got two little tabs here in the back that you can lift up and then that all slides off so let me move you over and we'll take off the air box next okay so we can take off the connector for the mass airflow sensor and then this has a couple tabs on the bottom the electrical connector and then I'm gonna have to go grab a five and a half millimeter socket there I always thought that was funny that it's five and a half millimeter kind of an odd size it seems like this should just come off there oh and a little bit dirty okay now this uh little air intake comes off just with those little clips for a little Clips here once those clips are removed this whole unit I think just pulls off yeah all right so that just pops out of there okay and then next to get this air box out of there it's like this one bolt there and one bolt here and then there's a just a rubber Fastener in the back that holds it down and just pulls out of that I think [Music] just pulls out of that back connector I'll show you it after I get it out yeah so the back connector is just this rubber Fastener that goes on that post there see that okay whoops so that's the the back Fastener that just pushes down on that post there okay so with that removed we can get to this final bolt down here there's another electrical connector that goes to the battery tray we'll have to remove looks like that just yeah pulls off and then that's the final bolt down there get that out the whole battery tray should be free to pull up out of there try not to drop this one down in the bottom there nice okay let's see yeah so now the whole battery tray is free so you can just pull that out over there the post in the back right there that the air box mounts to okay and then just in the back there's one more bracket here let me slide you over a little bit so hopefully you can see in the back here there's one more little bracket that's just used to mount the wire harness on there and I think with that gone these um I think cooling pipes that go to the heater core can pull up and I think then we'll be able to sneak the alternator right up through here that's the plan anyway all right so that's that little bracket that just down in the back there for the wire harness okay now we'll go back over to the other side and get the alternator free and see if we can pull it up out of there so this is all the stuff we had to pull out of the battery the battery tray the battery strap then the intake air intake the air box the air filter the air box cover the battery tray in that bracket so it's quite a bit of stuff uh but I think that this is probably still the easiest way to get your alternator out because you saw all that came out pretty easily so here's the alternator looking down at the back of the engine there's just two bolts that hold it in the one is that one there I'm pointing out with a green laser and then the other one is up here since there's not a lot of room here I find it helps if you take off this sound deadening panel from the bottom of the intake manifold it's got a couple Clips on the top here so it's actually got a little prongs on both sides of it so it's a little bit of a pain getting them out but then once you take those two top Clips off the whole panel comes off it actually Clips on the fuel rail on the bottom there but that gives you a little bit more room to work okay so the next part's kind of the worst which is you have to take off the electrical connectors off the back and probably you won't be able to see anything except the back of my head here so I'm going to see if I can get you positioned down on the bottom there so you can get a view of what I'm doing okay guys I've got you precariously stuck down um behind the engine I've got the camera stuffed down there so I probably sound a little echoey and I'm reaching in from the top so you can actually probably see better what I'm doing than I can but hopefully this gives you an idea so I'm working all by feel here so this feels like the uh the boot off and then if I can get on there I can remove that the bolt holding the lug let me try that again all right so hopefully I can get on that bolt there and remove the primary lug feels like it should be right about so there we go okay oops there it is I think you can see what I'm doing there like I said I'm just doing it all by feel so all right so there's the battery lug so that was the an electrical connector here somewhere oh there it is I feel like it's got a tab in the back that I think I just pull and then that pops off so that connector just pulls off and now the tricky part is hopefully you can see but there's a Christmas or not quite a Christmas tree but a push Fastener there and I can't really get in there to see it to um unclip it so what I'm going to do is just remove this whole back cover so I can get better access to that see if those are so there's three nuts on the back so if I remove those I can remove the back cover to the alternator and then I can remove that remaining electrical fastener all right so here's one of them all up and find them by feel all right here's another one yeah got it okay so that one's loosened up there's one more I guess that's hopefully the one that comes let me see if I can spin those out the rest of the way by hand now the only trick is not to drop these are probably never find them again all right there's one oh this was a little bit easier to get to in the front okay I almost got that one got that one and then there's one more up here a little bit tighter because it's right by the battery load there spinning for me though come on come on I just be really careful they're not drop it I think I'm gonna try to reach in there with a magnet too you can't really grab it then I'd maybe grab it with a magnet there come on here we go nice okay now the whole rear cover of the alternator should be able to just pop off okay so now I think I can get in here and getting access to that Christmas tree or they keep going Christmas tree faster but you really just a push connector foreign so what I'm going to do now is just hop up here and give the top of the engine a bear hug and reach in with both hands and see if I can undo that last fast a little bit more light here so okay at least I can see it see if I can remove it all right so there we go so the back of the alternator is off ERS disconnected now you could just take it out like that if you wanted to I'm going to put the cover back on because I don't want to damage anything in there when I'm taking it off so I'm just gonna put this cover back on that logo there it is okay I think that's special oh there we go that's back in place and I'll just put those nuts back on again like you could just be careful and take it out like that but it's back on just to protect it as I'm yanking it out right now way to go there it is and there's one more somewhere here I got that one already oh this one here all right so hopefully you can see something there it'll be interesting to see what you could see I'll move you up to the top now so once you get the uh all the connections off the back that's the hard part um then it's just a matter of removing these two bolts in the front and then there's the one down on the bottom here a bit tougher to get to might be easier to get to from the bottom but if I can get to it here looks like it's loose and reach down there with the camera foreign a little bit of a tight spot to get to all right just make sure both of those look the same and they do so now the alternator is free but it's pretty tight so uh we're gonna have to pry it out of there just to get a little more room I'm just going to get rid of this bracket so this has two bolts in it one in the front there where you can fully see I'm pulling out and then there's one in the back of it too all right that little bracket comes out of there so I thought this connector was pretty tricky to remove out of there I thought the easiest way was to pull back this little rubber boot and then you can feel that there's a tab on the bottom and you have to press it surprisingly far back and then with a little bit of effort you can get it to pop free so I stuffed a bag of Harbor Freight Rags down there just to catch it because I'm not sure I'm going to be able to grab it as I pry it out of there these alternators have those sliding bolts in the back um so they can be pretty stuck in place so I'm just going to pry it so the top is free and the bottom is still caught up in there a little bit these ratchet and pry bars are pretty handy for getting in tight places like this usually I can just work it for you the rest of the way so I've wrestled that out of there now I've just got to wrestle it over to the other side so I'll move the camera over so you can see that process so now I'm just going to slide the alternator across on the bottom I've got some bags set up on the other side too so I just um you know don't set it on anything that'll be bothered so I'm just going to slide it across and hopefully if it's out this side so there's a transmission cable I'm just pushing that down and then pulling these uh pipes up a little bit just trying to be gentle so I don't bother anything and pulls right out through and there's our prize so here's the alternator out of the vehicle of course so you can see a little bit of what was going on the back where it's a little bit hard to film this is the electrical connector and then this is the bolt that has the uh the primary output going to it with a big lug and then these are the three other bolts I took off to remove the back cover to get this push Fastener out of there because it's really tricky to release that push Fastener when it's back there so now we'll just go in and remove the back cover here the whole back cover price right off and then this is the brush assembly here so here's the brush assembly we are going to be replacing it's held on just by two screws but one word of caution they look like Phillips heads but they're actually JIS screws with Japanese industrial standard so if you don't know about that you might want to search on that um if you use a regular Phillips head screwdriver you might strip them out if they're in there tight so I'll be using a JIS screwdriver to remove these so in the past when I've done this sometimes these are pretty tight how these aren't bad at all and once those two screws are out you can just pull out the brush assembly and in there hopefully you can see the uh the brushes and then the two slip rings that they ride on in there and I've got a brand new brush assembly from Honda here so the new brush assembly comes with this little pin inserted in the back and that holds the brushes in a retracted position so we're going to place this on there and then pull out the pin which will release the brushes so obviously you can see this is a really simple process once you get the alternator out the actual brush replacement just takes a couple of seconds okay so once the brushes are tightened in there you can just pull out that pin and that releases the brushes and now we can just reassemble it and put the cap back on and then we'll just tighten these down so you can see the hard part is getting the alternator out but once you've got it out it's a pretty easy process so here's a shot looking at the new brushes versus the old ones the new ones are specified to have a length of 10.5 millimeters above the bottom here and you can see the old ones off my Honda are quite a bit shorter so let's see if we can get a little bit of a measurement so it looks to me like the old ones are about maybe five and a half millimeters or so so about halfway through their life and I've got about I think 124 000 miles on it so probably they would have made it well over 200 000 or so okay so now we just have to slide it back in there and again I've got you know bags of Rags down there to just um set it on so I don't bother anything down there let's go around to the other side and get it in place so hopefully I'll be in a spot where I can work and you can see if we'll pull this back over here and get it lined up where it goes it seemed like it um hinged pretty well on the bottom so if I can get the bottom bolt in I'm thinking I can use it as a hinge and then get the top up into place so I'm just going to keep wiggling it down until I think I can get that bottom bolt lined up okay I think it's close okay so I think I have the bottom one in so now I think I'll just be able to hinge it up and get the top one in and that should be lined up okay I think that's almost there all right so there's the top bolt in so I think both of the bolts are in now sorry I think all you can see is my arm probably okay let me go grab the torque spec for those two bolts okay so those are both uh 24 newton meters for both of those bolts 24 there just double check don't want the alternator falling off if you did put a bag of Rags down there don't forget to pull those out because sitting down by the exhaust pipe they'll probably catch on fire on you so now we can start putting everything back together I'm just going to hook up the electrical connectors on the back side um I probably won't show you that you know how that goes so now we just have to remember everything we took off so we've got this uh connector that goes back on there and then there's a little clip here we took off okay and then we have to get this little uh bracket back in here let me feel down there and line it up where it goes I'll put the front bolt in Loosely and then find the hole for the back one or tightening it down I think I got it okay and then we'll just tighten and then the bolt in the back there sorry I think I all you can see is my arm sorry about that okay so next we have to put the sound uh panel back in it's got these clips I showed you before they clip onto the fuel rail it's actually got these tabs so you can clip it on underneath for me it's easiest if I clip it on the fuel rail first that's the hard part and then put those other tabs in after and bend it back you can kind of feel where the fuel rail is and get those bottom Clips in place there we go this job there's a lot of pieces of it that are just uh by feel for sure okay I think we're good up here so now we just have to remember how everything goes back together and we should be in good shape I think this bracket one on there there's a little orientation hole there so not too bad a job overall huh all right and then this uh electrical harness holder gets connected there and I think next the battery tray goes back in all right that looks pretty lined up to me so while I'm at it I'll hopefully you can see down here I'm gonna just put that electrical connector back on there while I'm remembering and in this electrical connector goes back on the battery box and don't forget this one slides into place so we get it lined up correctly all right there we go and then there's a little clip on that one too today this one there one here and then there was the hard to get to one down here somewhere get that one started and then there's this final one up here that wasn't even sped up video all right and then this one here let's get this last one here with the extension oops with my socket there okay let's do a double check and make sure we have everything fasten down that used to be fastened down okay I think we're in good shape for the air box next I'm just going to squirt a little bit of silicone spray on that rubber there and on this one as well just put a little dab I think it'll just make it easier to go back on and that if we're lucky we just yeah push this back into place and then see if you can see I think I'm going to move you over a little bit so now we've just got these two bolts in the front thank you so the air filter goes back in there and then we've got the top of the air box sensor Clips back in there and don't forget to hook that baby back up and then this intake or where this goes on there little panel clips folding it in place panel Clips seem to hold up pretty well inside the engine compartment just down below where they never seem to be reusable okay and then we'll put the battery into and don't forget the little insulation piece clamp back in place snug that down just a bit okay don't forget this little uh holder here I guess okay and then we can just hook the battery back up and then don't forget this little clip and I did notice I forgot one theme which is just to push these um heater hoses back down in the little holder and I think we're in good shape oh man you guys forgot to remind me Project's done and I got one bowl left over so this is the bolt that mounts the PCM uh bracket down to the battery tray and I forgot all about that so show you the trick that I learned I think probably from Erico at South Main Auto if you don't watch his YouTube channel you really should because he's the best mechanic around um but if you stick a little piece of paper towel or something then it can hold it just long enough to get that bolt in where you need it to go so I think we'll be able to get it in without taking everything back apart feels like it's going in nicely okay so now I think we're really done and no parts left over what the heck I'll even pull out that little piece of paper towel for you just for completeness I didn't show uh also just tightening down this air duct I think that's the last thing I missed showing you guys okay so the Moment of Truth here let's start it up make sure it still runs okay so this is a typical theme whenever I take the batter out I get this the system's initializing continue driving I get the um TPMS sensor in the traction control light so let me just go and take a little spin make sure that all gets better all right so we'll just take a little spin out here I think usually the lights all go off pretty quickly yeah so just barely out of the driveway just loop around here just barely out of the driveway and all the warnings are off let's do one additional check here just make sure there's no codes so it looks good all the monitors are blinking because the battery was disconnected of course then if I go into live data then you can see that the alternator looks like it's charging fine the ECU voltage is 14.5 volts or so so I hope you found that interesting and potentially useful uh it's not too bad to do but it's definitely not a good first time repair if you've never done this kind of repair before you could get yourself in a little trouble on this one so but then again it's not too bad either so hope you found this interesting and thanks for watching