Patent ID: 7545064

Claim:
A vehicle alternator comprising: a stator having a stator winding; a rotor carried on a rotary shaft and rotatably supported inside an inner periphery of the stator; an electric device including a brush device for supplying an excitation current to a field winding to generate a magnetic field for the rotor to be energized and having brushes and a brush holder accommodating the brushes, and a rectifier for converting an AC voltage, induced in the stator winding, into a DC voltage; and a protector cover for covering the electric device; the protector cover including a cover body, placed in a position to cover the electric device including the brush device and the rectifier, and a cover convex portion axially protruding outward from the cover body along an axis of the rotary shaft of the rotor and formed on the cover body in an overall area axially placed in a face-to-face relation to the brush device and axially space therefrom to prevent an impact shock from being exerted to the electric device located inside the protector cover upon receipt of an external shock; wherein the cover convex portion has an inside formed with an open space in which no electric device is disposed to allow the convex portion to act as an impact absorber.