electrical problem?
 

I am having some problems diagnosing an unusual problem where my instument panel dials (fuel gauge, oil pressure etc.) will flicker like its not getting power; i experienced tghis problem before where the dials would flicker wildly plus the 'srs' light would come on, but i had the alternator rebuilt and this problem disappeared.
this problems seems to occur whjere i have the headlights and ac on at full power, but i tried parking the car and turned on the defrost, the ac, the lights, the wiper while at low idle and no flickering occured...is this a fluke or is it some kind of bad wire shorting out etc.?

I would start in the alternator area. I wonder if the alternator rebuild was done correctly?

It sounds like the diodes in the alternator are bad. That would cause the flickering, but no other apparent problems. A quality rebuilt will probably do the trick. The alternator is functioning but may cause problems in the electricalsytemif it is not corrected.

what would an ideal rebuild of alternator entail? they repainted it, which was nice, but i dont think it fixed it.

must add one qualifier though, the driver side door was mashed in by a little old lassie with lots of insurance while it was parked on the street. it will cost $2000 to fix, but as its insurance, i dont care...however, theyve ordered the part etc and im driving it mashed while waiting so i wonder if theres a short in the door thats causing the problem?

The alternator was checked using a device which measures the amount of charge going to the battery, and without a load it was about 14.75 and fully loaded at 12.5 at idle. The rebuilders said they replaced the diodes and they were confident they did a proper job; however, they noticed that at idle the charge would vary by 3/10ths of an amp(?) like from 12.7 -12.4 and they wondered if a clogged injector was causing the engine rpm to vary, as this variance would disappear as the rpm were increased. they replaced the volatge regulator as a precuation and i put some cleaning agent into the tank.

Is the idle rpm supposed to be contant, or will there be some variance, if so, by what %'age should it vary?