No way
You have to use DC-rated fuses to protect DC wires. One major misunderstanding (I've done this many times) is the believe that fuses must protect the device. They don't.
Fuses are supposed to protect wires from over-current and possibly catching fire. The chance that a fuse may also protect a device from self-destruction should be considered a side-benefit.
The way to think about it is that a device that has failed should not be allowed to propagate its failure to other devices or to the power supply wires. If that failure could cause a short or over-current fault that would cause its supply wires to melt/burn/arc, then fusing must be in plate to prevent that from happening. The device SHOULD HAVE been designed to fail-safe so that it doesn't self-destruct, but that's not always the case with hobby/DIY stuff, is it?
But if you take that philosophy to heart, even in your DIY RE system, then you should look at the thing as a chain of devices, each of which should not harm the other. So the maximum output power that the generator can produce, multiplied by a safety factor (an extra 50% I guess), determines the maximum current that can flow from generator to battery. If the wires are sized so that this current does not cause them damage, then you have one step in the chain taken care of. Now look at the rectifier. Is it sized to withstand that maximum current figure? Under all conditions? On your heat sink? If so then you have taken care of another step in the chain. Another step: the diodes have a number of failure modes, one of them is open-circuit and another is dead short (as you've seen). A circuit analysis can give you a ballpark idea of the current that flows in a short circuit but you don't have to bother, because it will be greater than the normal current, by a lot. This is where the fuse comes in. Select the fuse to allow the normal maximum current, multiplied by that safety factor, and then round up. That fuse will allow all normal operation, and prevent the wire from melting if the diodes blow.
Because I assumed that the diode could blow, and then the fuse blows next, I have purposefully NOT designed the fuse to protect the diode or the battery. It only protects the wire. And it also happens that the battery doesn't get drained flat or overheated, but remember, that's just an extra benefit of the fuse protection, not the purpose. By blowing the fuse now, the generator may overspeed because it will now run unloaded. Note that the diodes other failure mode is open-circuit, so it's the same difference. Designing the generator to not self-destruct under this condition is the last step in your chain of safety. It may already be able to handle that, in which case, you are done.