I've seen videos of stuff like this. It's not the easiest repair.

 

Shouldn't have to, but I Just wanted to clear this up...
When removing from the Top, it is the PASSENGER side mount bolt that you remove.

 

I gotta LOL if someone removed the driver side. But good point

 

So I just went through hell to get my Alt out, all to find out that the 4g64 alt does NOT line up. The holes are off by about 1/8 of an inch. I had to make this work so I finally pried it up and bolted it on only to discover that the serpentine belt now was too loose. so I definitely recommend anybody that is doing this to only use an EVO 8 or 9 alternator if you don't want the trouble believe me.

 

I didn't wanna risk it, so bought OEM. Expensive, but should last another 130k miles.

 

One of us got a different alternator then.

It's still kicking on my car. That's what I bought over the counter, could be a mis-boxing in either case. Sorry it didn't work out.

 

I removed the Alt from a 2003 2.4l Eclipse myself so... I did make it work, however, I went back and read through the comments again, and u mention the 90a working for you but wasn't 100% on the 95a. Just so happens that I got the 95a. Im not guna say that's what the problem is, but it's the only difference. With all that said, I've learned quite a bit from this experience, and I believe I definitely have the easiest way to remove these damn things.

I came from the top, and the biggest problem I had was getting around the mounting bracket. I watched CZEROMEDIA's video a few times and idk if it's the bad lighting in his vid, but I just don't see that damn mounting bracket. Anyways, what I did was:

¹loosen the bracket from the bolt that is halfway behind the water pump pulley enough to swivel the bracket. Push the bracket all the way down.
²Remove the Pass side motor mount bolt so that the motor can be jacked up an inch. It wouldn't jack up more than that for me bcuz the tensioner pulley hits the frame.
³This is the part that makes it easy AF. Remove all the bolts from the bracket that hold the ABS unit in place. (I think I removed 3 down low and 1 up by the strut tower.)This allows to push the ABS practically back to the firewall giving u more than enough room to rip that sucker out!
*Now I did follow Czero's instructions and removed the FPR, but I'm not sure you need to do that. I'm not 100 that u even need to jack the engine up, but I already had it up so... it's very possible that u only need to do step 1 & 3

 

*Update*
so since my last post on this thread I have come across some new info about using the Eclipse 2 4l Alt. If you read above you'll know that I used the 95a Alt from an 03 Eclipse 2.4l and I had trouble with bolting it up. Well I am now 99% sure that the 95a that only comes on the 03-05 Automatic Trans Eclipse has a slightly smaller bolt hole pattern. Meaning the holes are about ⅛-¼" shorter than the stock Evo 8/9 90a. However the 90a from the 00-05 Eclipse Manual Trans will fit according to member "Project_Broke".

 

My alt mounting bracket just fell off (solid mounts + 2.3L + deleted balance) ... Every bolt literally falls off my car until I put thread locker.
I really wanted to take this on and do it, but looking at my AMS intake manifold, there's no way I can reinstall the bracket without removing the IM.

Any suggestions?

 

with the AMS... it has to go out the bottom... unless you remove the intake.

 

Posting this one for the RHD crew. My car is an Evo 6, so this may only apply to 4/5/6 owners, but it might be helpful for 7/8/9 RHD as well.

I thought this job would be easier on an RHD but it is probably harder - the brake and especially the clutch master cylinders were very much in the way and the hardlines meant doing anything more than nudging them was not happening. Going out from the bottom was not an option because my down pipe is welded to my turbo outlet by rust, so it needed to go out the top.

The 6 (and probably the 4/5) has only one bolt holding the alternator to the brace, and removing the brace is not really an option, but it is not really in the way either.

List of things I removed or loosened to yank the alternator out the top, in no particular order:
- Strut tower bar
- Brake master cylinder (loosening the two bolts holding it to the brake booster allows flexing the lines)
- Power steering line (loosened per above, but I'm not sure how much this really helps)
- Brake booster hose (unclamped from booster and set aside)
- Oil dipstick and tube (unbolt from bracket, turn 180 degrees, and yank out)
- Fuel pressure regulator (remove per above)
- Intake manifold grounding wire (remove the bolt attached to the manifold completely and set aside, if you leave the bolt installed it will get in the way)

You might want to consider loosening the clutch master cylinder. This requires disconnecting the master cylinder from the pedal, loosening the two nuts holding it to the firewall was not enough to loosen it. I did not, but by that point I had bashed the bejesus out of my brake and clutch hardlines and I figured I wasn't going to do any more damage to them by just yanking the damn thing out.

The serpentine belt does not have enough room to be removed from the alternator until the alt itself is unbolted, so go ahead and take the belt off the crank pulley to remove tension from the belt completely.

Pic below is how my alternator came out and how the new one (pictured) went in:


Honestly it was a big PITA. If you have to raise your engine for the timing belt service and your alternator is older than 5 years, I'd just replace it then like the water pump.

 

Going through the bottom is 10x worse, IMO.
Also, I agree on swapping the alternator, if you can find OEM. Otherwise, I would never pull the OEM alternator unless it failed. Once you go aftermarket, you will be swapping them, on the regular.

 

why would it be harder going thru the bottom? at this point i'm at expert level detaching the control arm from frame side(remove oil filter), detach tierod/SB link, remove axle. the alternator fits if you bring it in at an angle. use zipties so you can work the upper bracket with one hand while the other arm supports yourself working from above. I did this 2x in a row in order to test a new one and a backup. no need for re-alignment
i got an autozone/duralast 90amp and a 180amp ebay unit. my dragracer friend 'borrowed' the 180amp recently to address his dual pumper issue. looks like he wants to keep it