starting issues-possible electrical

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linke30
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Post Sun Jul 30, 2017 8:55 am

morning all!

so a bit of a weird one, ill do my best to try and explain and hopefully someone can guide me haha.
320i convertible

so a couple of days ago I went to start it. it turned over nice and fast but didn't fire. tried again, let it turn for a while and it spluttered and then idled fine.

yesterday morning it turned over rather slow compared to normal but started first time and idled fine.

next time it started no problems what so ever.

last night it was slow turning over and noticed the battery light on the dash. turned the lights on, and the stereo started going on and off.
makes me think maybe stereo is draining battery? old sony tape player. I took the face plate off the stereo in the hope it might help what ever the issue. wipers were bit slow too at the start of the journey.
picked up curry, got back in hoping it would start and it turned over quick and fired quick.
only a 5 min drive so I doubt the alternator would have charged battery up enough to make that difference.

had full service only couple weeks ago, including the belts.

check oil light came on yesterday too for the first time in about a month. could be a coincidence as I was planning on cleaning the oil sensor when I first got the car on the road couple of months ago but it sorted itself.

noticed the distributor was a bit worn when we serviced it but seen a lot worse. but I don't want to start throwing money at it just yet if I can help it.

the list of things to sort out is growing :(

any help is mucho welcome
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Brianmoooore
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Post Sun Jul 30, 2017 10:01 am

Take the air filter/AFM assembly out, then remove the regulator pack from the rear of the alternator. Check the length of the carbon brushes, and look for signs of arcing on the end of the shortest one.
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linke30
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Post Sun Jul 30, 2017 11:39 am

ill try and have a look today. cheers Brian, are you thinking defiantly a charging issue then rather than something else?
or is it just the easiest thing to check first?
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linke30
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Post Sat Aug 05, 2017 5:39 pm

only just got around to doing this today. been away working otherwise I would have tried!
the brushes are the same length and don't seem to look to bad. they don't come out very square though. they seem to hang or sag a bit.
I tried gently pulling on them and gave it bit of a clean.

the battery seems to be flat now. lights ect work but just clicks when turning the key. got the battery on charge now so will try and see again tomorrow.
belt seems fine as far as I can tell and was done only few months ago.