I've owned a few gbodys over the years and they all had one (if not many) common issues. If the car sits idle (not running) for a few weeks, the battery is drained to <10%. I'm capable of debugging this issue but haven't had the motivation since my gbody is connected to a battery tender (trickle charger) when not in use. Does anyone know of any common gbody issues that could cause this? This has to be a common problem..
Battery Drain
- Thread starter foxtrot
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My Regal when I got it would sit for a few days or so and it would appear to drain the battery enough where it would not start the car and I am thinking about the only thing that should draw power when it is off is the memory for the radio but when I checked the battery voltage it was still almost at 12 volts
What I have found is many of these cars still have the original battery cables which can be corroded without being visible and besides I feel they are barely adequate in size so for my Regal the first thing I did was make some new positive and negative cables out of 1/0 fine strand welding cable and I upgraded the alternator charge wire going to the battery to a 2 gauge with no other changes I have not lost any power since and I contribute this to too much resistance/corrosion in the factory wires I replaced.
And I also made sure my all grounds were clean which they were.
What I have found is many of these cars still have the original battery cables which can be corroded without being visible and besides I feel they are barely adequate in size so for my Regal the first thing I did was make some new positive and negative cables out of 1/0 fine strand welding cable and I upgraded the alternator charge wire going to the battery to a 2 gauge with no other changes I have not lost any power since and I contribute this to too much resistance/corrosion in the factory wires I replaced.
And I also made sure my all grounds were clean which they were.
to check to see what is draining the battery remove the ground wire from the battery and connect one side of a circuit tester to the negative post in the battery and the other side to the negative battery cable. Then remove one fuse at a time and when the light in the circuit tester goes out when you pull a fuse that is the circuit that is drawing power
Even if there was an unwanted draw on the battery when the car was off, you would still measure 12 volts. It's the current draw that needs to be measured. To measure the current draw when the car is OFF, disconnect the positive battery cable and use the DVM in series on the current scale.
Anywho, my battery cables are new in the past few years.. So they are not the issue.
Anywho, my battery cables are new in the past few years.. So they are not the issue.
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this issue has been with this car for thirty years over many alternators, so I don't think it's the issue...
GREAT idea - don't know why I didn't think of it. That should help narrow it down. Thx.
Sorry for the confusion but I was only checking the battery voltage prior to putting my charger on, I wasn't testing for any kind of current draw.
Though the battery cables appeared fine on the outside they were very corroded when I cut the ends off, obviously with new cables on yours that is not the issue.
Ok - here is what I found out.
My isolation method was the on that Pontiacgp mentioned above. I basically used my DVM in series on the positive side and removed one fuse at a time. Turns out that the 30 year old security devices in the car along with the radio memory backup were drawing a combined ~300mA. I removed one of the old security devices because of the 30 year old backup battery. The other security device is still drawing 120mA thru the ignition ckt. When all was said and done, I'm now dawn to 170mA. With all of this said, I'm not sure it explains the entire picture because even @ 300mA draw I'm thinking that it should take many more weeks to drain the battery. Maybe there's something either intermittent or something (such as the removed security device) that intentionally wakes up every so often and as a bi-product drains the battery. Anywho, as mention before the battery tender is hooked up when not in use so I'm done with this science project for now.. Thx for the tips.
My isolation method was the on that Pontiacgp mentioned above. I basically used my DVM in series on the positive side and removed one fuse at a time. Turns out that the 30 year old security devices in the car along with the radio memory backup were drawing a combined ~300mA. I removed one of the old security devices because of the 30 year old backup battery. The other security device is still drawing 120mA thru the ignition ckt. When all was said and done, I'm now dawn to 170mA. With all of this said, I'm not sure it explains the entire picture because even @ 300mA draw I'm thinking that it should take many more weeks to drain the battery. Maybe there's something either intermittent or something (such as the removed security device) that intentionally wakes up every so often and as a bi-product drains the battery. Anywho, as mention before the battery tender is hooked up when not in use so I'm done with this science project for now.. Thx for the tips.
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