Electrical help required urgently

vocky

have you disconnected the radio and amp ?

JohnnyN

That's my next job this weekend. I'm going to pull out the head unit and disconnect the live feed from the battery and also i'm going to pull the amp live.

vocky

do you use a trickle charger Johnny ?

I have my vx permanently connected to one when it's in the garage

JohnnyN

I've got an Optimate trickle charger but i've not used it for a while as i was thinking that the battery should last more than a week?

vocky

it should last more than a week really, vx220's can run flat after about 4 weeks due to the alarm

disconnect the amp and head unit, see what happens

Matt

Any luck yet Johnny? Did you manage to get the HU out and see if it was that causing the issue?

JohnnyN

I've not had time to really get near the car the last few weeks. Work has gone crazy again and i'm struggling to get the time to do anything at the moment. The battery is back on the trickle charger at the moment. I'm hoping to get away early one night this week. I've got the engine mount brackets done now so i'm going to have to pop over to Daz for his handy work shortly. I'll wip out the HU and disconnect the amp whilst i'm over there. I'm also thinking about checking the courtesy light circuit again too. This was the only circuit that had a drain on it when I checked last time, but it was only a small amount. My glove box light hasn't worked properly for ages either. I can remember bending the contacts up to make the light work a long time ago, i'm just wondering if that could be an issue?

I'll tackle them all soon.

;-)

MikeS

amps are also known to start falling apart inside concerning the capacitors leaking, they can easily earth themselves against casing

JohnnyN

I admit defeat!

After spending £59 on a new multi timer module, it had no change to the battery drain. Today I have been out and had another fiddle. I connected up the bulb tester and set about removing every fuse from the fuse box. The bulb stayed lit with every fuse removed yet somewhat dimmer after removing the #13 Lighting circuit fuse. I did notice that when I removed the #13 fuse that there was a clicking noise now coming from the drivers footwell. I removed the cover to find a Delphi control module making a clicking noise. Each click made the bulb pulse light/dark??

I've removed all the lights from the interior over the last few days, removed the HU, amp, rear electric window switches, disconnected rear electric window looms and removed the total closure unit that I installed a long time agao from LMF.

So as of today I've had a gut full!

When i've got the time I shall be booking it into someone I can trust and they can sort the bastard out!

BTW, thanks for your help Neil this week. ;-)

Picture of the clicking Delphi module.........

vocky

thats the receiver for the central door locking, go on disconnect it and see what happens :think:

JohnnyN

I may have a go at it later in the week. I'm feeling depressed with it all now!

noth.

MikeS

central locking brain as your locks are all solenoids

they do tend to go faulty especially on cavaliers

JohnnyN

If there was a fault on the central locking unit, would it not affect the door locking action?

Also, the total closure unit from LMF is spliced into the wiring of the central locking unit too.

Matt

You need to earth those total closure kits don't you John? Although, you've said you removed that kit and it still kept the bulb lit....... notsure.gif

JohnnyN

Its spliced into 3 wires and also wired directly to a main earth point. I disconnected the earth wire but not the others. If there was a problem with a short, i assume by removing the earth wire it could still be a problem?

vocky

to be honest removing the negative wire isn't enough, you need to remove it completely as it's pointing to that system being the cause of your battery drain.

JohnnyN

Here we go again........

With the help of ephid0r (Mike), I am going to attempt to have another crack at this tomorrow. After spending over an hour with me on MSN the other night and him scrambling around the wiring diagrams, I now have a list as long as my arm of things to check but I am getting a little worried that the whole problem may be centered around my rear electric windows. This system is on the same circuit as the Fuse 13 which shows to only operate the interior lighting. When i've pulled this fuse before, it drops the amp drain considerably but I never realised just how many other components operate off of this.

I have done some research into twhen I fitted the electric windows and it was 14th July 2006. Shortly after that I began having problems with the battery gradually turning the engine slower and the central locking doing its thing slower. I then looked into when I bought my Accumate trickle charger. This was in October 2006. The reason for buying this was because I felt that I shouldn't have to keep putting my battery charger on the car becasue I was worried about over charging it.

Things are pointing towards the windows. The other night when I was going through things with ephid0r it was looking like it may be the switchable TC that I fitted but that was done way back in 2005. So, i'm going to get up early tomorrow morning, armed with my list of earth points and multimeter and i'm going to have another go.

Wish me luck!!

MikeS

good luck m8

tell us how u get on !

remember your interior lighting / central locking all run off the your door switches - your rear electric windows run off the rear door switches & they are directly earthed to earth point 3

and fuse 13 controls your interior lighting

all 3 wiring diagrams all mostly earthed off earth3 base of LH A PIllar

Matt

Hope you finally get to the bottom of this one mate.

JohnnyN

Right! I've been outside since 9am and its now 12:05pm and i'm PISSED RIGHT OFF!!

The drain is 0.22 amps.

I've disconnected the electric window looms and there's no drop. I've disconnected the power sounder and there's no drop. I've disconnected the central locking module and there's no drop. I've disconnected the earth point at the bottom of the drivers side A pillar and passenger side A pillar and there's no drop. I've removed all the door pins switches as these are earths for the interior lights. I've removed all the earth points under the black cover under the bonnet. I've removed the TC mod that I did and still no drop.

What I have found is this, if I remove fuse 13 and fuse 34, the amp drain drops to 0.08 amps.

Fuse 13 (2000 model onwards) 10A Interior Light
Fuse 34 (2000 model onwards) 20A Instruments, Radio, Carphone, Infotainment System

I cannot access Earth Point 4. Listed in the Haynes Manual as E4 Bracket, Steering Column/Crossmember??? Where is it?

notsure.gif :evil: notsure.gif

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