Kenbo, you are trying the car alternator at the moment i understand ?
You need to excite the field winding via a 12 volts supply, through a 3 watt lamp otherwise nothing will happen. ( perhaps 0.78 Volts )
The stator windings of an alternator have not got enough remanent magnetism in them to create enough flux for self excitation.
At relatively low speeds you should be able to generate a couple of Ampères.
