Grounding a 6 volt regulator

I'm going through the test procedure for diagnosing a 6v charging system not working and was wondering what is the proper way to ground the regulator which is one of the steps to perform. I ground the surface on the tractor before mounting it so that is clean. The attaching metal on the regulator is shinny.

That is as good as it gets. Shiny metal to shiny metal. To be sure it is grounded. see if there is resistance between the tractor and the regulator frame. Zero resistance is good infinite resistance is bad. Jim

That should be enough. Is the regulator mounted to the tractor mainframe instead of to the body of the generator? When mounting to the generator, I would clean the gen to bare metal as paint and rust are not grounds (or as I prefer chassis).

All I can add, some that mount on rubber grommets or straps used a ground wire from the base to a separate ground screw on the body.

I agree with the other fine gents, bright clean shiny solid frame ground to the regulators metal frame ought to do the job. If things don't check out maybe use a good jumper wire to go direct from the batteries grounded post to the regulators metal frame n see if that makes a difference ?????????

As you already know BOTH the genny and VR/Relay need good grounds. In the event she's charging ONLY if you used a jumper to dead ground the gennys FLD post (tells you the genny itself is okay) BUT NOT OTHERWISE the regulator isn't working or not well grounded or a wire is missing/open. (Or if a cutout relay system the light switch may not be well grounded, see below)

NOTE you mentioned "regulator" yet some of the older and 6 volt systems just used a 2 wire CUTOUT RELAY (NOT a full fledged VR) and the gennys FLD got its ground via a wire up to the Low/High manual charge control light switch. On those systems the Low/High switch may not be well grounded due to rust etc. Do you have a full fledged VR or a Cutout Relay and Low/High manual charge control light switch????????????? Regardless, the relay still needs its good ground to work right and the gennys FLD post needs its ground via the light switch.

John T
John Ts Charging Troubleshooting