I have 2 1963 mercury montereys (ford galaxie) both have the same issue . Battery will drain over night , I installed new battery's still dose it , radio , lights are off . Any suggestions . I was told the voltage reguator could cause this ?if so best way to test Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Disconnect negative side and place a test light between the negative battery post and the negative cable- if you have a drain the light will be on. Now methodically disconnect things or pull fuses and when the light goes out that will be the source of the draw, either a complement or circuit with a faulty wire or component. This should help you track it down so you know where to concentrate your efforts. It will be an easy fix but it may be a difficult find.
Greetings! If you don't have a wiring diagram or service info for your car you might check with your local library, the one here in the city has two on-line data bases, one is accessible from home, the other you have to access at the library. Has been a big help when working on both early and late-model vehicles
A charging system that's not putting out it's full "effort" will let your battery die overnight because the weak charging system was unable to both maintain the battery after starting as well as running your vehicle's electrical system. Have the alternator , or generator checked, along with he regulator, and the battery. Do the system drain tests described above as well. Let us know what you find. HAPPY RODDIN' 4TTRUK
I don't think it's the charging system , I can charge battery fully off car , hook if up and walk away , dead next day Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
If it has any of those radio noise suppressors hooked to the regulator disconnect it and see if the problem exists,I had a couple go bad and they will drain the battery in a few hours.
If it dies over night you should be able to remove the battery cable, tap it on the post and see a spark which indicates you have a short somewhere or something is drawing power like a light. Charlie Stephens
My cheat sheet says those have alternators and that raises the possibility of a blow diode in the alternator. A stuck contact in the regulator could also cause a drain. Over the past 50 or so years a few things I have seen that cause drains on batteries over night or in a shorter period are: Blown diodes in the alternator stuck regulator Dirt an moisture on top of the battery. Check across the top of the battery in several places with the leads of a volt meter to see if you don't have power draining off through dirt and moisture on top of the battery. Just put the + lead on the + post and touch the top of the battery in various spots to see if you get a reading. You should not get a reading in any spot except the - post. Light on in the glove box light on in the trunk dome lights left on Little brother that goes out and plays your radio (s) while you are at work. Had a student actually have that happen with his Monte Carlo in the late 80's and we went nuts trying to figure out what was draining the battery in front of his house (he left the car home and took another one to work) until his mother says " Oh, Joey and his friends play the stereo every when you are at work". While he was at work his little brother was thumping his stereo until the amp ran the battery down. It didn't take long to fix it after that. I'd make sure the battery top was clean and then do as 31Vicky with a Hemi suggested and hook the test light between the - post of the battery and the ground cable and start pulling fuses or disconnecting things. I wouldn't be disconnecting the battery cables and looking for sparks as Charlie Stephens suggested. That might be a real good way to blow a battery up in your face. Some of those old redneck test methods aren't very safe in the real world.
Sometimes the curent draw will be so low that a light bulb won't do the job, then it takes a dgitital volt/ohm multi meter with sensitive 12 V ammeter. Somewhere on the meter it will indicate the max amps thru meter capacity. Put an inline fuse in series with the meter with a fuse rated slightly below the meter capacity. Use the meter/fuse combo instead of the bulb and you can get down to find really low current draw stuff. Found blown diodes in alternator on OT DD this way, and it wouldn't pinpoint it with bulb.
What were the results of your carbon pile load test on the battery? Oh, wait ... you haven't done one yet? A good place to start is at the beginning ...
Mr 48 Chev,... The diode failure was the cause of overnight battery drain in the wife's 97 T Bird. New alt. fixed it up. 4TTRUK
Honlude , This should help you out // What is parasitic draw? All vehicles draw some power from the batteries when the car is shut off. Certain accessories such as clocks, radios always need power. The normal power used is called parasitic draw. It is always a very low draw so it doesn't run the battery down. If there is an electrical short in the vehicle or a malfunctioning accessory it could be drawing much more than its normal load causing a drain on the batteries. The first thing to do is a test for a major short. Remove the positive and negative cables from the batteries. Put an Ohm-meter across the positive and negative cable. If your reading is close to 0 Ohms then you have a direct short. 150 ohms is not out of the normal range. You need to trace the short before you can perform the following tests. In order to check for parasitic draw, you need to be careful so you don't ruin your meter. At the risk of sounding like an elementary teacher, here's what you need to do. If you don't already have one, get a digital meter capable of reading up to 10 amps DC. Sears sells them for less than $50 - I bought one on sale for $14.99 that I leave in my truck. Your battery must have a reasonable charge for this test - it won't work if your battery is dead. Quick proof - if your dome light operates normally, you're fine. My truck wouldn't start and the batteries were down to 5.5 volts so I put a charger on the batteries overnight. They are now 12.2 V. When I started the truck the voltage went to 14.3 V so the alternator is working. Check to make sure ALL loads are turned off. Unplug anything you may have plugged into the cigarette lighter. Remove your keys from the ignition. Close all doors so the dome lights are off. Disconnect the thick positive (Red) cable that goes down to the starter. To start make sure your meter is set to the 10 amp DC range. Some meters have a special connector for the red probe when you are reading current. The meter pictured on the left has one jack for high amps and one for low amps. If yours does, make sure the meter end of the probe is in the right connector. You can either do this next step by just holding the meter probes to their respective contact points (you won't get a shock from 12 volts) or you can use probes with alligator clips to snap them in place so your hands are free to do something else. Connect the positive probe to the battery - either battery is fine, electrically speaking, since they are connected together by the negative (Black) wires. Polarity on digital meters doesn't matter because they are autosensing. Connect the negative probe to the red cable that is still connected to the vehicle. Make sure this cable and your probe do not touch ground. If there is a severe current draw (more than 10 amps) it will either pop a fuse in your meter or destroy it outright. That's why you need to test for a short, otherwise, your meter should now be reading the current drain on your battery. If your vehicle has an alarm system or remote locks, the current draw may be around 2-3 amps for a few minutes after you last close the door. This is normal. If you're not sure, wait at least 20 minutes after you last open or close a door before you take a reading. If everything is normal, you will read less than 35 milliamps, or .035 amps. If the current drain is higher than that, you need to find out what is draining your batteries: You can start by pulling fuses until the load goes away. If that doesn't reduce the draw, you need to look for a wire that is corroded or frayed. Hope this helps you out .
"Dirt an moisture on top of the battery. Check across the top of the battery in several places with the leads of a volt meter to see if you don't have power draining off through dirt and moisture on top of the battery. Just put the + lead on the + post and touch the top of the battery in various spots to see if you get a reading. You should not get a reading in any spot except the - post. Light on in the glove box light on in the trunk dome lights left on" Absolutley all of the above! Surface discharge is so often overlooked it aint funny,,,so are all the lights mentioned...good call up there.
I have used a warning buzzer hooked up as a test light. That way, while you're under the dash trying to remove fuses and find the problem, the buzzer is an audible clue when you find the source. Stevie Wonder-approved. Cosmo
Then maybe the battery has an internal short that is causing the drain. I assume the outside of the battery is clean and it is not discharging through a path of dirt/moisture. Try charging the battery off of the car and leave it set overnight to see if it loses it's charge. Charlie Stephens
The only and easy sure fire way is the test light elimination method.Diodes in alternator seem to always be the problem.
Great write up and that's exactly why I use a test light thru the negative cable/post. Lol Smoking a meter isn't fun and that suburb explanation is more than I care to type. At the end of it you still have to eliminate one fuse, circuit, component at a time. Also the buzzer is a great idea if you can't get the light where you can see it.
Take the battery and have it tested,a battery can be fully charged and have absolutely zero cold cranking amps. If this is the case the battery will by all indications act dead. HRP
If your battery has been going dead every day, you can bet that it's shot as well. Used to be said that a battery loses 10% of it's power every time it goes dead. Not sure of that, but still... Find the short/draw, fix it, then get a new battery.
No I have 2 separate cars doing the same thing , replaced battery once , I it has to be a draw not a bad battery , odds of having 3 diff battery's , different manufactures would be low Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Again,take the battery to a auto parts store or a place that just sells battery's and have them check it,rule that out,just don't say they are good. Cold Cranking amps may be non existent. HRP
Lets put this into perspective .... If your car were here, I would be able to tell you in less than 1 min if your car had a parasitic draw. Another min to test the Battery. 2 mins! If there is a draw - In less than 30 mins tell you exactly which circuit or component was causing trouble and narrow the search down possibly pinpoint the culprit. That's 32 mins to get you on the right track. After that there's no telling what it may "entail" but you stop chasing "your tail" and get to finding the meat and potatoes of the problem
31 vicky is right and has a good method of testing. One small warning, while you are pulling fuses and testing things shut off the dome light. If you have the door open it will give you a false reading if the dome light is on.
copy paste from here 31 its so easy http://www.flashoffroad.com/electrical/Batteries/BatteryDrain.html .
Thanks for all the suggestions , I'll see if I can try them this week Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Please note that when I first recommended using a meter rather than a bulb, I stated to put a fuse of less capacity than the ammeter circuit in the meter in series with the meter before trying the meter method. That fuse in series will protect the meter in the event of a dead short somewhere. I've seen the draw from a blown alternator diode be less than .30 amp, not much, less than required to light a bulb, but still enough to draw down a battery in a car not driven daily. Guess maybe I was a litle lazy also about writing a novel to explain the procedure I use. Don't want to argue on this, just pointing out that my method won't burn up a meter if you use the fuse in series with the meter.
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