![]() So, remember to get that all-important battery test regularly. Summer heat is brutal on batteries, and winter weather is even worse. If your car battery begins to die, you can often look for warning signs to prevent getting stranded. Accidentally leaving the lights on in your car can also cause parasitic drain and lead to a dead battery.Ĭar batteries generally last between three to five years, depending on your climate and how many accessories rely on your car battery. This means your battery is still powering things like the radio, the dashboard clock or even the alarm system when your car is not running. Your car battery can only last so long before it fails when you're not driving because of key-off drain.Īlso known as parasitic drain, this occurs when a car's electrical system continues to draw power from the battery-despite the vehicle being shut off. If the water deposits are "before" the fuses you won't see a problem if you check for drains by substituting a meter for each fuse in turn.How long does a sitting car battery last? A car battery can last about four weeks to two months before it dies. To test for this all you need to do is to clean well around one terminal – you just need to break the circuit.ĭoes the car have a history of leaks or other water damage? Water usually contains dissolved minerals so leaks around fuse blocks or relay panels may create high-resistance shorts that won't blow a fuse but that will add a small drain. Is the top of the battery clean? Dirt, especially damp, conductive road dirt can drain a battery without an obvious load. With the engine running the voltage should be higher – maybe not much higher at idle, but if you bring the engine up to a normal cruise RPM, say 2,000 or so, you should see something between 13.5 V to 14.5 V (a bit more or less isn't necessarily a problem). With the engine off the battery should be 12.6 V or even a bit more. Some things to check that could cause a battery to drain, even when you don't see obvious loads after checking with the fuses: You can do this by pulling each fuse in turn – the one that causes the load to drop is the culprit, keep going until you are down under 50 mA. Much more than 50 mA and you should start looking for drains in the electrical system. ![]() The drain should be a few tens of milliamps at most. So the first thing that I would do is to measure the drain of the whole car by disconnecting the ground terminal from the battery and then measuring the total drain with an ammeter between the ground (negative) terminal on the battery and the cable you disconnected. Your car is old enough that I wouldn't be too worried about that. On newer cars, there is a risk that disconnecting the battery may cause problems with your radio or other on-board electronics. You mention, "no draining electrics," can you say more about how you determined this? It's important because "a self-draining battery" requires something that is causing a load on the battery – especially since you have a relatively new battery. This post may be of further assistance to you. Find the circuit which has the power drain on it, then find what's on that circuit to kill the aggressor. which in the grand scheme of things isn't a lot. While batteries do lose power over the long term by just sitting, it should only lose about 5% of its reserve per month. It will help you narrow down what exactly is going on. If by pulling the fuse you get a noticeable drop in battery drain, whatever is causing the drain is on that circuit. It is, however, an indication of where the power drain is coming from. The fuse in and of itself cannot be the cause of the power drain. When the circuit transmits too much electricity, the fuse heats up, then "pops", not allowing anymore electricity to flow. ![]() (This is the reason why the copied area you have posted has 5 "Not Helpful" votes against it.) The fuse is only a conduit. It wouldn't be the fuse which is causing the power drain, but the circuit the fuse is there to protect.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |