So for the last few days my 2010 X-type 2.2D has sounded a bit weird, and I thought it was a wheel bearing or drive shaft issue because that's what it sounded like, a constant whooomm noise when I got to about 50km/h.
So I took it for a spin this evening and the red battery light came on, so I immediately assumed it was an alternator issue, and my scanner seems to have confirmed it with a P0622 error.
I thought I got a bit of a funny smell in the car too, a bit of a chemical/antiseptic smell, maybe electric, but it was only there for a few seconds and I could have been imagining it.

I'll go and properly check it out tomorrow, but I thought I'd just ask here first in case these symptoms ring a bell with anyone.

I'm thinking either the electrics or maybe the bearings in the alternator are shot, but I'm leaning more towards the electrics. I don't think it's the belt because the power steering was fine, in fact it was maybe a bit too fine this evening as I found it a bit easier to turn the wheel than normal, it felt very free, so maybe the alternator is putting less load on the engine than usual? Would this make sense?

 

gijoe, I would start with a voltage check of the system. Make sure you don't have a bigger issue. If the voltage is good, then I would see if you can possibly get a little bit of oil on/into the bearing to see if you can make the noise change. If so, then it would confirm an alternator bearing. After that, there is always the old school way of removing the serpentine belt and doing a quick spin with a cold motor. If the noise goes away, then you know it is on the accessory belt.

 

I concur with Thermo that it is a good idea to start with taking off the serpentine/drive belt.
Make a sketch yourself, too, of how the belt is to be mounted, additional to the info you will find on the net (especially the routing towards the front of the car is confusing and easily done wrong). But if you do your own drawing additional to looking up official reference material, the chances are better of getting it right later, when you want to put the belt back on...
The belt is being removed after getting the tension off by using a huge 3/8 ratchet or similar to take the tension off the tensioner.
Once the belt is off, check the belt itself and every pulley, especially the idler pulleys and the alternator pulley.
The bearings of the idler pulleys are prone to failure.
You may be able to find a generic replacement-pulley in an automotive shop.

 

So I just checked the voltage and the battery was a bit low with the car off (Just 12.0V), but when I started the car it jumped to 13.6V (~13.8V-13.9V when I give it some revs), still a little low but the alternator still seems to be charging the battery some bit anyway.
When I cleared the P0622 it came back immediately, so it's definitely a "constant" problem.

I'll take off the belt there and have a look if the weather clears up a bit later.

 

gijoe, looking up the code, it is saying that the voltage that goes to the alternator to generate the field has an issue. I would say to start with the 3 wire plug that goes to the alternator. Make sure the pins are silvery in color. If they are rust colored, that is your problem. From there, you can be looking at either a bad alternator (bad field circuit), a problem with the ECU, or the wiring between the ECU and the alternator is defective. The wiring will be only found by hand over handing the wiring. Hope this gives you some more clarity to your issue.

 

Yea, I was going to check those tomorrow, I have the workshop manual and stuff and I was looking over those troubleshooting steps earlier.

But do you think it could only be a wiring issue, since I was hearing the vibrating noise at ~50km/h for a few days before the errors popped up, and I thought I had a bad bearing somewhere.
Like could the vibrations be from an internal issue with the alternator if it was a just wiring problem?

I haven't been able to get the belt off yet either because I need that stupid tool for it! I've been looking through my tools, and random stuff, but haven't found anything that will fit down in there yet. All my 3/8 sockets are too bulky.

 

If the alternator is causing the noise, you should be able to recreate it through simply raising the engine RPM up to say 2000 RPM and then putting a load on the alternator. If you can't do that, then I would be looking elsewhere.

 

**** yea, that's a good point!
But I tried it there, and no, I can't hear the noise when I rev the car when it's parked, but I suppose it could be an intermittent sound too because I haven't really driven the car much since. It might even be the AC that's going bad and perhaps I only hear the sound when it kicks in. I might check that later.
I haven't been able to get the belt off yet, so I ordered one of the tensioner tools for it and it should be here in a few days.

But I did some further testing, the 3 tests in the workshop manual for P0622 (voltage, 2 resistance tests) and they all came back fine.
I did some more testing on the car and found that it is still charging the battery at ~13.5V, and if I rev it up to 2000-2500rpm the voltage goes up to about 13.8V, but if I switch on any of the accessories (lights, AC, etc) it immediately drops down to ~12V or below, and then climbs back up once the accessories are switched off.

And the P0622 always comes back immediately when I clear the code.

I'm thinking the alternator is starting to go bad, but I suppose I'll know more when the tensioner tool arrives and I can see how the pulleys are.

I had also been getting a few random injector warnings a few weeks ago, and got another one today, and I changed the fuel filter since then, and added some injector cleaner, thinking it was an injector issue. But now I'm thinking that it could have been because the voltage was dropping below 12V and I just hadn't noticed it.

 

So, the tensioner tool finally arrived today and I was able to remove the alternator to have a look.
All the other pulleys seem fine but when I spin the alternator there's a kind of a light clicking sound from it, it sounds a bit like a dry leaf stuck in a fan, so I just ordered a new one.
So I'm assuming that's the issue.
I'll leave an update in a few days once I fit the new one.

 

gijoe, the fact that you can turn on some accessories and the voltage drops to 12ish volts tells me the field winding is toast since you ruled out the wiring. Correct me if I am wrong, but only on the diesel version, the alternator is internallly regulated. So, you don't have a lot of extra wires. This would go back to it being an alternator issue. I need to see if I brought my diagrams with me while I am on travel.

 

Yea that was my thinking too, because the wiring is capable of sending 13.8V to the battery, but the fact that it doesn't do it when the accessories are on makes me think the alternator just can't keep up.
When I fit the new one I'll see if the vibrating noise goes away, if not I'll search for that afterwards. I'm thinking the noise might have just been obvious when the alternator was trying to work harder, with an increased magnetic field causing something that was loose to get flung about with more force..

But yea, I'm pretty sure the alternator is regulated by the ECU alright, because the troubleshooting steps in the manual for P0622 only focus on the wire going to the ECU (DL01), and the ground wires. And the "possible sources" also include an ECM fault.

 

GIjoe, if you have a wire from the ECU to the alternator, I would see if I could get a wire or lead from a multimeter on that wire at the alternator. Then you can measure the voltage on that wire. You should see like 5 volts at idle with no load on the car and if you put say the seat heaters, headlights, and rear defroster on the alternator at idle, that voltage should go up to near 11 volts. If it goes to 12 volts (same as battery voltage), then the alternator is overloaded and that would tell me that your alternator is on its way out as it should handle that load at idle. If the voltage on that wire is only at say 8 volts (anything not near 11 volts), then you have a wiring problem or the ECU is internally faulted.

 

I did these tests listed below alright, the ones listed in the workshop manual.
But I have the alternator off the car already now, and I have the new one already ordered.
When I heard the clicking from the old alternator, and saw that the other pulleys (AC, tension, etc) were OK, I assumed that the alternator was the issue. I suppose I'll know for sure once the new one arrives!

If the issue still persists with the new alternator I'll definitely check this out though, thanks..

 

So, for the sake of completeness:
The new alternator arrived today and after I fitted it it immediately started charging the car to over 14V at idle, so it was definitely an alternator issue alright.

Thanks to all for the responses.