Battery drain (intermittent) - tried everything

vanman1936

Junior Member
Messages
77
So just had her serviced and some new exhaust valves fitted by a great independent who know their cars / GTs, running great....love affair rekindled in some ways (valves sticking were peeing me off).

Battery problems have persisted last 3-4 months - new battery, navtrak disconnected, checked by two well known garages who say no problem, however.......it intermittently drains flat.

Last week, left for a week - fine. This week, three days and dead. So in and so on.i haven't had a two week period with no drain yet. I know they do lose a charge, however 3 days to flat battery must mean some drain....or is that normal?

Rechargeable jump pack saves the day every time (great things).....i can't run a cable trickle charge as street park it.

I am stumped. My heated seat feels a tad warm even when off, not sure they work when the ignition is off so not sure it's that (it may just be my warm personality).

Ideas appreciated.....she is running so sweetly and this is taking the shine off a bit.
 

CLRut

Member
Messages
120
My Strad battery veered from being fine (no issues of drain from week to week) to loosing all charge within three days. In the end, it was a completely failed battery with a couple of (broken?) cells, which must have degraded very quickly at the end - surprising on a car just over one year old. No issues since new battery re-fitted.
 

allandwf

Member
Messages
10,958
Does it coincide with moving the seat at all? I have heard of the controls for them sometimes intermittently draining the battery, but that was Mercedes.
 

StuartW

Member
Messages
9,306
Sounds like a good auto electrician needs to take a look and try to get to the bottom of it, I would be stumped too.

And glad to hear that yours was just a battery Craig which I assume was changed under warranty? The batteries on Maseratis take a big pounding, cranking that V8 each day, and they need to working properly to be up to the job
 

spkennyuk

Member
Messages
5,932
So just had her serviced and some new exhaust valves fitted by a great independent who know their cars / GTs, running great....love affair rekindled in some ways (valves sticking were peeing me off).

Battery problems have persisted last 3-4 months - new battery, navtrak disconnected, checked by two well known garages who say no problem, however.......it intermittently drains flat.

Last week, left for a week - fine. This week, three days and dead. So in and so on.i haven't had a two week period with no drain yet. I know they do lose a charge, however 3 days to flat battery must mean some drain....or is that normal?

Rechargeable jump pack saves the day every time (great things).....i can't run a cable trickle charge as street park it.

I am stumped. My heated seat feels a tad warm even when off, not sure they work when the ignition is off so not sure it's that (it may just be my warm personality).

Ideas appreciated.....she is running so sweetly and this is taking the shine off a bit.

Can the seat electrics be unplugged for a week or two and see if the battery still drains ?

Even if you can unplug one at a time then it should prove or disprove if the heated seats are at fault.

One at a time and you would know which seat if it is the seats. Both seats first. If the battery still drains then its not the seats.

If it doesnt still drain then plug one of the seats back in. If the battery drains again then its that seat and if it doesnt still drain its the other seat.

Above subject to you being able to manage without the seat electrics for a week or two.
 

allandwf

Member
Messages
10,958
Can the seat electrics be unplugged for a week or two and see if the battery still drains ?

Even if you can unplug one at a time then it should prove or disprove if the heated seats are at fault.

One at a time and you would know which seat if it is the seats. Both seats first. If the battery still drains then its not the seats.

If it doesnt still drain then plug one of the seats back in. If the battery drains again then its that seat and if it doesnt still drain its the other seat.

Above subject to you being able to manage without the seat electrics for a week or two.

It wasn't as simple as that with the Merc. It was something to do with the ECU, and the position memory.
 
Messages
1,117
Battery drain problems are time-consuming. I put the Mercedes in at the main dealer and £400 later it was fixed - the secondary (back-up) horn for the alarm was dead and so was its separate battery (in case someone disconnects the main battery to steal it). Solution was replacement horn alarm and back-up battery and all is well. They ran several different tests with their STAR system and have an in-house auto-electrics guy who tracked it down quite quickly through a systematic and structured approach. I bet if I had tried it, i'd have spent pounds more changing battery then this, then that and so I've learnt that some stuff, it goes to someone who knows what they are doing.
 

vanman1936

Junior Member
Messages
77
Found it at last.

Exhaust valve aftermarket remote device causing drain. Straight line fuse on battery so didn’t show up when conducting normal tests on standard fuses / relays. Redirected via a relay so only draws when running now.

Much relief....back to perfection.

Used a tracking device that also reports battery performance to help monitor it - CarLock, great product.

Thanks for replies.

P