Battery drain

P

parabolica

Member
Car wouldn’t start at the weekend after a week of sitting; battery was dead flat. Charged the battery, car fired back up. Been using it a few days but once again, car is dead. Haven’t check the battery yet but 99.99% it’s the same issue.

Best case it needs a new battery - fine. But mind started wondering - what if the alternator is goosed instead? Or some other parasitic drain. I can’t think of anything that would drain the battery so it’s either the 10 year old battery or a knackered Alt.

How can you test the alternator? Would it throw a code on Carly maybe? Don’t fancy spending £££ on a new battery only for the same to happen again within a few days.
 
Hi bud

You ok?

Think it’s worth double checking you have nothing switched on at all- I fell foul of the sidelights

After that it’s worth checking the amps not volts on the battery- but would be surprised it degraded that quickly unless you have an alternator on the way out

Ive in the past rigged a volt meter inline to see what the drain is on the battery when it’s all locked up- google what it should be drawing in that state then if it’s higher pull fuses until you find the culprit?

Not fitted anything new recently?
 
Hey bud,

No, nothing new fitted. Double checked everything was off when I refitted the battery. Found a thread on here from a few years back -someone had the exact same issue and it was the alt. Just looked up a test on YouTube so going to get stuck into it tomorrow - after my dad comes and gets me with a spare battery so I can get home!
 
Saw on another thread which is worth a search

Instead of replacing the alt look also at replacing the back part of the alt (can’t remember for the life of me what it’s called) hold on
 
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