what happened to my alternator?

[Montehall]

Drove the vette to work, its a 12 mile transit.
About a half mile in, my voltage came up at 10.5v and steadily dropped as I drove, figured my alternator was shot, but I was going to make it as far as I could. In the last mile, voltage hit 8.4v then shot up to 13.6v and stayed there until I turned off the engine. DMM revealed 12.5v on battery.

Found this on my 1.5 y/o alternator
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v257/Wilson1911/20150604_134023_zps1ex1xrsc.jpg

It started right up at the end of the day and got me home, with voltage dropping only in the last quarter mile.

[Bill]

Were the mounting bolts for the electrical wires tight? Perhaps a wire has a short somewhere?

[mrvette]

All that rust/corrosion is obviously getting hot and melting the red insulation plastic.....get another alternator, and make sure that red wire end is changed out for a new one, and SOLDERED to the red wire....that't the main power output wire, the other two are for the regulator.....

Under that rubber boot, I can't imagine how water/whatever got in there to cause that kind of corrosion....maybe toss the black rubber cover/boot away, I have for years now.....

[DukeAllen]

As a fellow C4 owner, I believe it's protesting being mounted in a C4.