Hello AZ,

So I have been having electrical issues with my car. I have a battery that is less than a year old and I just replaced Positive and Negative connectors (entire wire assemblies due to the previous battery leaking acid all over them and corroding them), I did this about a month ago and have had no problems until now. Well, for about 4 or 5 days now I have been having to jump start my car every morning...

At first I thought that maybe it was my alternator so I jumped my car and then took a voltage meter to my battery while it was at idle. The results, 14.55volts give or take .4 volts... so my alternator is charging my battery. To back that up, once I get my car running, it runs fine, no dimming of headlights or car struggling to idle or run.

So then I thought maybe it is my battery that's not holding a charge... possible but highly unlikely... So when I got home I disconnected the negative terminal from the battery and left it over night. In the morning, I reconnected it and my car started right up, no problems in 30 Degrees.... so my battery is holding a charge.

So now i know its not my battery, its not my alternator, something is leeching off of it when i turn my car off. I checked all of the lights inside, trunk, door, dome, glovebox, nothing.

So now I'm here, how do you find what is draining power from your car when its turned off? Ohm meter to fuse box/battery?

please help.

 

Your battery at rest should show a draw of .07 amps or less give or take. If yours shows more than that, start pulling fuses one at a time and replace them until you hopefully see a big drop with one of them. That will be the bad circuit. I have never done this myself but I have read that this is where you start. Good luck, others may want to chime in.

 

ChucksCL, thank you for your reply, I didn't know a bad fuse would drain the battery. I just assumed that a bad fuse "broke" the circuit an there was no flow of electricity thru that fuse..

 

It's not the fuse that's bad, it's whatever is wired to that circuit.

It's like if you blow the fuse in a surge supressor everytime you turn it on, you start by unplugging the devices on it until it stops.

Same concept. If you pull the fuse you are not providing power to that device(s). So if you pull the radio fuse and the problem stops, you know that it is the radio.

 

thanks NSXNEXT, looks like I'm going to have to pull a ton of fuses haha... Lets say I find what's draining my battery, will a new fuse fix the problem or is there more involved? It seems that there would be more involved but I just don't know how electrical things work.

 

Fuse will not fix the problem, only identify which circuit is draining the battery.

 

My problem is similar. I pulled everyone of my fuses and it did not find the bad circuit the meter remained pretty consistent between 11.74 -12.25 constant draw from the battery. Made a post and nobody has replied to my post.

 

I wish I could help you out but electrical circuits really arent my thing.

 

Well I found out a while later what it was that was draining my battery, maybe it is the same for you. I noticed when I turned my car off that little lights under the window buttons would stay on. So I started pulling fuses until they went off. It solved the problem but that fuse also went toward the automatic locks. So I have to manually lock and unlock my car. The windows still go up and down when using the buttons... I have had no problems since pulling this fuse and tested it several times to make sure this was the problem.

 

Thank You for your input but I have pulled all of my fuses with no drop in voltage but thank you for sharing