Hey guys, haven't been here in a while. My car is currently sitting at 128k miles, and now I've run into a problem.

After my shitty stock battery died, I replaced it with the Optima Yellow Top battery. The car has been fine ever since. That was around 50k miles and about 2.5 years ago. Last Thursday, tried to turn on the car, completely dead. As in the car wouldn't even unlock when I used the key FOB. No big deal, thought it was the battery, took it out to get replaced. Advanced Auto Parts replaced the whole battery for a new one, free of charge. Plugged it in and it was good to go. For good measure, me and my dad busted out the multimeter and tested the battery. 12.something volts when car was off, 14.something volts when car was on. Breathed a sigh of relief, and ruled alternator problem out of the equation. Checked to make sure no lights or anything were on, went about my weekend. Drove the car all weekend with no problems. Parked the car in the garage last night around 10. Now, today, I went to the car and it's completely silent again. Nothing works. No lights, nada. Don't have a multimeter currently, so I can't really test anything. Anyone have any idea what could be the problem?

List of all lighting modifications:
Full interior LED lights
LED DRLs
LED Reverse lights
LED footwell lights, front and rear

 

You measured the voltage of the new battery, or the old one? If the old one then that wasn't the problem. I'm assuming it was the new one.

Sounds like you have an excessive draw. You need a multimeter to test this.

I don't know acuras procedure, but generally you have everything off and the disconnect a cable from the battery, Digital multi meter on amps, put one lead on the batt, and the other to the cable. Shouldn't be much more then 50 mA, again Acura may have another spec, since who knows what computers are on all the time. Also, most computers don't power off fully for several minutes to perhaps as much as an hour of you "turning off" the car. When you first hook the DMM you may have to wait for the computers to enter this power saving mode again to get an accurate reading.

Once you've established that you have an excessive draw, time to find the circuit. With everything off, and the battery hooked back up. Remove a fuse, and put your DMM (set to amps) leads into the block where the fuse was. Again, with everything off, but the battery hooked back up. When you find your high amp draw circuit check everything on that circuit.

 

You can come over and we can check this shit out if you want lol. I have a MultiMeter. That is... if you can get over here

 

Something is probably drawing some load while the car is off. This happened in my old car and it turned out it was my amp that I had installed. It was wired to a fuse that got power while the car was off.

Your electrical mods look pretty basic so I'm not sure what would be causing it.

 

It's worth a shot, but have you checked your HFL (hands-free link??)? That seems to be the issue with many of the 3G owners. Bluetooth continues to draw power. I've read it with a few MDX owners as well.

 

What about the HFL would be on? I'm really hoping this is the problem...What should I be looking for? I use the HFL a lot.

 

I believe the HFL box is directly underneath the glovebox. Unplug it and turn off/lock car while you are inside and use a multimeter to test the plug outlet to see if it is drawing power while the car is off.

 

You can try holding the "hangup" button on the steering wheel for 10 seconds to see if the HFL is working properly. It should repeat a message in 40 languages or something like that.

 

In a previous car the draw was the alternator. The alternator would charge slightly, but also drain when off. Had to disconnect the battery each time. Get your alternator tested just incase if possible.

 

So what was it???

 

I may have an issue as well, I have no Mods at all. I had my OEM battery replaced (Acura, free) in 2011 after a few very long starts in the cold. A year later on the new battery in the cold, I had a few long starts as well. I concluded Acura batteries are week and not well made.

This week in the cold, after warming the car up via remote start. The car almost did not start and took 3 tries to start it (this is after it ran to warm up). I was thinking I was not going to be able to start it but it finally did. So I don't have time to miss work because of a battery issue and Acura service could not fit me in, I figure I will just buy a new battery and be done with this issue. New battery seems fine so far (first day today), the odd part is when I had the tech install the new battery, I asked him to tested the old one and it tested OK.

I hope I don't have some other issue here, I never had a completely dead battery at all in this car. Also maybe I should have gotten a new free one from Acura because I still was within the 2nd's 3 year replacement. But tired of feeling like in the cold it might not start.

 

Just replaced mine with an Interstate. Heard of others problems i'm at about 40k and was loading a bunch of cd's in the hard drive and it sucked battery dry.
For 75 bucks went to costco and bought and replaced battery myself. Lost seat settings but phone and hard drive still good to go.

 

acura/ honda batteries are trash, if you guys are buying new batteries buy an aftermarket one.