Ok. so it's been 2 weeks. I got a new Battery (optima Deep Cell) New altenator... regular series 4 altenator... replaced all chassis to engine grounds. replaced all major wires going and coming from the Alt. to the batt.


I've replaced almost everything that makes up the charging system. And what does my car do to me tonight after work? Dead battery. I've got a bad habit of checking everything before i turn car off. Radio.. Lights (even though it was daylight) nothing stays on in my car. WTF! is wrong with my electrical charging system... it's getting to the point where i'm getting pist at my car. Please guys, some help would be great.

 

Bump.

 

Bump.

 

ok, the best way to find a load on the electrical system is to do a voltage drop test. to do this be shure everything in the car is off. measure the batt voltage with the terminals on, and then measure the voltage with the terminals off. there should be little or no difference. (ex. 12.78 and 12.77) in your case i am shure that if your batt is dead in 8 hours you will see a .2v or more drop. now with that info and a full charge hook up the terminals and the meter. remove the dome light bulb and the keys. have a friend watch the meter. now remove and replace each fuse while your friend watches for a voltage change (jump). when this jump is seen check that circuit and find the load. otherwise remove that fuse when the car sits.

 

are you saying that something is staying on even when the key is out and all lights and accessory's are off?

What stay's on? CPU? something else? How bout if i just wire up a kill switch on the battery. Turn the car off, than kill the switch. this will work just the same right>?

 

of course my radio settings will be whack every time i get in my car. I just wanna know WTF is wrong with my car. damnit! 300 bucks in electrical replaced crap and still leaves me stranded

 

thats why i gave you a trouble shooting procedure, blindly replacing everything (NATZI tuneup) rarely works. find what circuit the load is in and go from there.

 

puting a batt switch in is a bandaid on a bullit wound. yea its better than nothing but not a fix

 

This is a very good procedure, use this to find the faulty curcuit. Then, you have an idea of which components to check that deal with that circuit.

 

A current draw test would be better, anything over 70mA will drain a battery down pretty fast.

 

Try this remove the negative cable from the battery and connect a test light to the cable and poke the needle part to the negative of the battery.If it lights up, you have a short in the system somewhere.To find the short you can disconnect things till the light goes out.Also check for burnt or melted wires.

 

what else could be drawing current? i dont have an aftermarket radio... i have a bad habit of turning everything off when i get out of my car. Even in broad daylight i'll check the lights and make sure their off..

I dunno, she's really begun to upset me.

 

in order to find out what it is you need to stop looking at this as if something was left on. Truth is you have something shorting out somewhere. A wire is making contact where it shouldn't be. Follow the procedure that Wankel posted and see where it leads to. The other tests will work too. Once you find out which fuse affects the numbers, check EVERYTHING that runs off of that fuse. it's time consuming but not that difficult. Considering how much you just replaced, it is likely to be something that you touched/rewired, since it wasn't doing this before. Above all, relax man...this is a simple one compared to some things we go through for the 7.