This morning, went out to my car, and my Driver 1 keyfob didn't work. The light lights up when I push buttons, but car doesn't unlock or lock or open the trunk. So I grabbed my backup Driver 2 keyfob, and same thing.

Any ideas? Car battery dead? Both remotes lose pairing?

 

Also - checked the car battery and the was some corrosion on the Positive terminal. Cleaned that up, but no difference.

I can manually unlock the car, but the immobilizer system is engaged so can't start the car or turn on the radio, etc.

 

Check your fuses...#6 IIRC...
how about your interior lights and radio...anything else not working?

Shitty battery makes these cars do funky stuff...

 

Interior lights and passenger airbag light work, but dash lights and radio aren't turning on (I assumed because of immobilizer) but yeah, maybe it is a bad battery.

Will check the fuses.

 

Probably fuse 6 or battery...
I think that's what it is, man.

 

When you say fuse 6, do you mean under the hood or the interior fuses?

 

Driver kick panel.
If it's blown, figure out why...or it'll just keep happening.

 

Turns out it was just the battery. Very strange dead battery behavior though, every dead battery I've had with previous cars, you could tell it was coming, cause it would get weaker over several days, then would crank and fail to start.

 

quoted for posterity.


Computers plus low voltage = ???????

Glad you figured it out OP.

 

He figured it out?


Please and thank you.

 

Well, apparently it WAS a dead battery causing the total lack of response (wouldn't even attempt to turn over), but it appears I have some sort of other electrical gremlin.

Got a new battery earlier this week, after getting the jump. Battery was 4 years old and was pretty hot, so seemed like could be the culprit.

That was on Tuesday. Car drove fine rest of the day Tuesday, and Wednesday and Thursday. Was off work yesterday (Friday) and didn't drive at all. Went out to my car this morning (Saturday), and same thing as Tuesday....nothing from the keyfobs, battery is totally dead.

Google tells me maybe the HFL is causing drain? I replaced my HFL about 2 years ago, cause it was broken - phone wasn't connecting, and it was warm/hot to the touch.

Think that HFL might be dead again? Any other common battery drainers on these cars? Mine's an 07 with navigation

I'm pretty sure that after the battery replacement, my HFL was still working, but I've seen some posts here where there have been different failure modes. Some like my previous experience, where the HFL is totally dead/won't connect (that didn't cause me any battery drain), and some where it works, but just stays on.

 

 

Disconnected the bluetooth module on Saturday, after getting a jump. Car has been fine since then, but also hasn't sat for more than ~12 hours or so.

Will up date this post if battery drain persists, but so far so good.

 

Welp, it appears something besides the HFL is causing battery drain.

Car was fine all last week when I was driving every day, but then it was parked all of this past weekend and I needed a jump this morning.

Time to bust out the multimeter and start testing I guess.

 

Keep us posted.

 

Well, it appears the problem with the new battery was.....the new battery!

Took car to mechanic, they did some testing, couldn't find any parasitic battery drain, and decided to test the battery, then replaced it.

I feel like I won't know 100% for sure (new mechanic, they seem trustworthy, but I'm always skeptical) until I let the car sit for a couple of days again, since with the previous new/bad battery, car was fine when driven every day, but only died when left sitting for at least a day and a half or so.

Planning to not drive anywhere this weekend (easy enough, living in a city), and keeping my fingers crossed that it holds charge. If it does, I'll be returning the battery to advance auto (or autozone, or wherever it was).

 

Crazy.

 

Well, problem started up again last week, and got worse quickly.

Went from the battery being dead after sitting over night, to it dying after just 2-3 hours.

Took it back to the shop. Just got a call that it might be the ECU, but they're doing some more testing to confirm.

 

ECU can be purchased from a partout if you need that. Don't let them highway rob you

 

Got a call from the shop today (day 4 that it's been there).

They said they found the power draw is from the Fuel Injection ECU, was drawing 0.5 - 1.5 mA on Friday. Of course on Monday, the car started up no problem, and there was no battery drain! Said they think disconnecting the fuses probably reset the ECU which could've corrected the problem. Or possibly early signs of future ECU total failure.

 

Final update on this, I think.

Got the car back last week after shop said resetting ECU fixed the problem at least for time being.

Battery died a couple days after getting it home. Decided to try swapping out the AC Compressor Clutch relay. Did that last Weds/Thurs, and car has been fine since then, including sitting for 36+ hours.

Yet another lesson in why I freaking hate mechanics. I emailed them a link to another thread here, and pictures from the factory service manual, asking them to test the relay. But apparently that still wasn't enough info for them.