I know that and you know that, but do you really expect a "yummy mummy"
with a hot bod and great sense of humour to know that? Come on...
really!

(c;



In m krem wrote:
From: "krem"
Newsgroups: rec.audio.car
Subject: Any amp experts online today?
Date: Sun, 02 May 2004 19:28:02 GMT

The AC can't work if the car isn't running ......... no compressor

wrote in message
...
In article ,
wrote:

I have a slow drain on my battery and I can't track down where the
problems is. I spent this afternoon tracking down where the
problem might be. I thought it was with a modification to my
lighting system I did but I eliminated that and I'm still having
the drain problem.

snip

In Kevin
McMurtrie wrote:

That's not the right way to diagnose the problem.

Pull one of the cables off the battery. Wrap one stripped wire
around the battery post and another around the cable. Put the
cable back on the battery post loosely. Attach an ampmeter (5+ Amp
range first) between the two wires. Now lift the cable off the
battery and monitor the current. It's important that the car's
electrical system be powered to 12V before sending current through
the amp meter; the rush of power would kill it. Slide the cable
back on the battery while you change ampmeter modes to avoid
current surges.

Now start pulling fuses and disconnecting things. You'll see
exactly how much current each device is using by watching the
reading on your ampmeter drop.

It's possible that nothing is drawing too much power. Anything
less than 50mA is OK. That's 1.2 AH per day of drain. Batteries
can self discharge if they're in poor condition or if unpure water
has been added to them.

Thanks for this little tutorial on properly measuring the current and
troubleshooting this sort of thing. It's always good to get tips from
those more experienced.
I did that test and the initial reading was about 65mA which I'm
guessing could still be safe, yes? no?

I'm starting to suspect that it may now just be that the battery is
going on me. It's almost 5 years old, it has been used on a fairly
powerful system for 2 years, plus last week my wife had to pull over
and feed our 2 month old while she was out and she drained the
battery by trying to run the AC and fan while the engine was off.
That probably pushed the battery over the edge. Since it was down so
far that she had to ask someone for a boost.

Friday night I did disconnect the battery completely from the
electrical system and the voltage on the battery remained at 12.25V.
Last night after I got the car back together around 11PM I took it
out for a quick 5 minute spin. When I got back the battery read 12.
75V and with all cables connected it read about 11V this morning.
Could the battery just not have a proper "amp" capacity now and that
65mA current is causing that drain, whereas on a new charged battery
it wouldn't be an issue?

And thanks to the other posters for the info. It's good to know that
my two amps aren't a problems. My voltmeters show that I'm getting 14.
2V when I'm running the car, so I'm suspecting that my alternator is
fine, though I guess I show check the cables running to it.

Thanks again.