Ron Lee wrote:
In retrospect, the alternator to bus wire/ring terminal should have
been made better long ago. That will be corrected. I am now in the
process of trying to decide which readily available alternator I will
install. The current one will not fly again.

Not that I wish to impose upon your own maintenance decisions or state
that safe is, in fact, not better than sorry, but the alternator may
well be just fine (excepting the ring terminal, of course).

Alternators have to be supplied with a sufficient current from the
battery in order to generate the larger currents required by the
aircraft systems. This is fine as long as the alternator is functioning,
because it is generating enough current to recharge the battery (and
then some). Without that initial current, though, the alternator will
never work, no matter how hard you spin it (a generator, on the other
hand, would).

It sounds as though the ring terminal broke, disconnecting the
alternator, and the battery discharged sufficiently in the intervening
time such that the alternator couldn't achieve a proper magnetic field.
Your mechanic's suggestion to add an additional battery in parallel
provided the system with the amperage it needed, and the alternator
began to work again.

My advice is to have the alternator tested before chucking onto yonder
scrapheap. Regardless, glad to hear you and the aircraft escaped unharmed.

TheSmokingGnu