The car would run okay but then would always have a dead battery. There was occasional weirdness in the tachometer, with a bouncing needle occasionally doing odd things, rev dependant. The car would occasionally stall out completely, which was an even bigger issue given the flat battery. Measuring the voltage across the battery at idle showed around 10.5V. This seems to be classic bad alternator behavior so a rebuild is necessary.
May 14, 2021
NOTE: The only issue here is that the bolt is lightly long and a deep socket is necessary. When reinstalling, we should cut the length down.
The approach was to remove the tensioner bolt, the pivot bolt and then slide the unit out between the coolant pipe, headers, fuel tank, and block. We could not achieve this, as the pivot bolt hits the dipstick.
Drained the coolant and moved the pipe aside to attempt to make more room. No joy.
After much frustration and research, we discovered that the only way to reasonably remove the alternator is by removing the alternator mount that attaches to a block. There are two 17mm nuts and some shims. Getting to these nuts requires obstruction wrenches.
Wrenches were ordered from Amazon.
May 29, 2021
NOTE: Cynthia calls them Italy Fingers.
