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Current Leakage - How To Identify Source?

bombastic

By bombastic,
in Car Audio & Electrical

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bombastic Collaborator

bombastic

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Just had a new alarm installed in my r33 yesterday, but the battery went dead overnight. I gave it a charge, and checked the current coming out of the battery with no interior lights on - 400mA. Seems like quite a lot. I thought maybe the alarm might have a backup battery which would be charging, but it should have been done by now if it was.

I tried pulling fuses in the engine bay - no difference. The only fuse in the boot which made a noticeable difference was the main fuse, which doesn't tell me much (even then, something was still drawing 100mA).

Are there other fuses in the car I can check? I thought of removing power from the alarm but it's in a really tight spot and all black wiring etc.

What to do?

Thanks!

DRD-00F Grand Master

DRD-00F

Posted
Posted

talk to your installer...

its that simple... alarms are something left to proffesionals, especially on such nice cars... and its his work too, you should never let one sparky touch another sparkies work...

Chris Rogers Grand Master

Chris Rogers

Posted
Posted

so you have a current probe? pull fuses until it dies. this includes the alarm fuses.

400mA is enough to flatten a battery over night.

failing that - take it to the fitter and let them sort it out..

bombastic Collaborator

bombastic

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I'd be taking it STRAIGHT back, its only 1 day old! Installer needs to fix the problem.

I'm just gonna see how long it takes the battery to run dead again. I had the car for 6 days and it always started easily, and that included 2 days of not driving it. So if it dies in less than a few days, I'll know the problem was caused by the install, and I'll ask him to come back.

bombastic Collaborator

bombastic

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Posted (edited)

Turns out it wasn't the installers fault at all, just a huge coincidence that the battery lasted a week no problems then died the day of the install.

I pulled the stock headunit out and that dropped most of the leakage (thanks Chris). Still 150mA elsewhere though (100mA on 'TAIL L' fuse and 50mA dunno).

If anyone has any suggestions on what to look for on TAIL L I'm all ears!

Cheers!

Edited by bombastic
bombastic Collaborator

bombastic

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Props to Leon for a fine job after all :D He spent half an hour on the phone to me today discussing it, and was going to come out tomorrow and sort it out for me until I discovered the fault.

I won't plug the name of the business in this thread though as I would hate for anyone to be put off by the title of the thread if they did a search. But if they have read this far then no harm done.

Apologies if I gave you any grief, Leon! The main reason I came on here and posted was I wanted to be as sure as I could that it wasn't your fault before I got you out. SAU wins again, credit goes to Chris for suggesting stereo.

Chris Rogers Grand Master

Chris Rogers

Posted
Posted

stereo is a common one. clarion and pioneer of that vintage use the same amplifier (usually a toshiba item.) and it develops a short. worst one I saw was 1.25A. that fried a battery over night before we found it . (this was an alpine unit)

spoke to him for 15 min myself before he rang you clarifiying your problem. get a base draw on the car (should be 50mA or less) and work out where the rest of it is. 150 Ma will drain a battery but NOTHING like a 400mA one will. if you drive the car daily it wont be a probelm. problems ring us first :D

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