Alternator without battery?

[201er]

If some kind of battery/connection failure in flight were to knock out power at the battery end, would electrics still work off the alternator alone? Can the alternator keep its field going without a battery source?

[N201MKTurbo]

It can until it goes off line, then it will not come back up without a battery. You can try it with your car. Remove one of the battery terminals with it running and see what happens.

that was the advantage of generators, they had enough residual magnetism in the armature to self excite.