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Thank you for the update. Good job on the auxiliary ground wire. That addition accomplishes three things. It now provides a solid ground path for the starter, alternator charging, and field wire circuit. You mentioned that the charge voltage is now set at 27.4 volts. That charge voltage is too low. I would like to see you charging around 28.8v in moderate to cool weather. There are some regulators that were set for a low charge voltage. That technology is long-since outdated. All battery manufacturers now recommend a much higher charge voltage. At 27.4v you are only getting a ~70% charge of your battery.
Replacing the flush, non-pull type breakers is really not that scary. I'll bet we have a similar configurations. If you remove the little screws that hold the circuit panel in you will see that behind the plastic overlay is a thin metal backing piece that the breakers go through. We replace that piece and mount the new breakers to it. The entire mock-up can be done without interrupting your current configuration. Once you have the whole thing built you transfer the faceplate over and hook up the wires to the new breakers. I would walk you through the whole process. The cool part is that I have the template for the sub-panel.
Back to the current project. I would encourage you to replace the field wiring to both alternators. I used 14 gauge to keep the resistance low. In the spring you can do all the related switches.
Sounds like a fun project.
Dave
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