Power Drain

I've recently upgraded the sound system in my 90 Clipper meaning I had to run 12v from my battery to the boot where there's an amplifier.

Since doing this i've noticed that my battery is going from fully charged to brown bread in less than a week. I thought the solution would have been as simple as downgrading again and removing the 12v cable from the boot.

Anyway, after removing the cable, the problem remained. I took a Voltmeter to the battery and tried to find out what was causing the drain and was also able to check the alternator to see if that was charging the battery as well as it should, I ended up replacing that with a refurbed unit because it just old and tired.

Problem persists…

I've learned to just put up with the problem by disconnecting the positive terminal on the battery after each journey but its annoying and I think its causing my alarm to have a personality disorder.

Can anyone suggest anything else? Has anyone had similar problems?

Ive tried to go over as much of the wiring as I can to check for arcing and loose connections but I cant find any, could it be a relay?

Thank you

Mat

Alternator doing its job? Can't see amp doing it harm if you have amp on remote from head unit making it go off when radio is off.

Does it go on long enough trips to charge itself properly?

How long did you leave the battery once it was flat? If it was allowed to drain to completely flat, it damages the plates inside a battery and it will never accept full charge again and also start to 'leak' current.

Having said that, if the problem is solved by disconnecting the battery, then the battery should have survived, although it might not achieve full capacity again if gone too flat and/or left too long, flat.

I'd be tempted to put an ammeter in series with one of the battery terminals then investigate any non-standard wiring and pull fuses individually, to see where the current drain is. Its possible the problem existed before your upgraded stereo wiring, but the battery has weakened so that its now an issue, where previously the battery coped with a small current drain.

If a battery goes below 8 volts here, I write it off, never be any good...cant have dodgy batteries in war lol

disconnect the radio and amp next time. if problem solved then you need to check the wiring for them, they arnt switching off. one of the more common causes for battery drains, that and dodgy alarms. check boot light switches off too if you have one

Hi, cheers for the replys!

As far as I know, the alternators working ok as the voltage thats being pumped back into the battery from it is more than whats being drawn from the battery with everything connected and active (alarm, amp). My voltmeters getting on a bit but thats saying the battery is knocking out 12V's and its pretty new so I dont think its that, however when it went completely dead the first time I left it without charge for a week or two..

One thing i've noticed is another live wire from the battery, it looks pretty OEM (not bodged in) so I was thinking it was going to the dashboard to feed perm. live for hazard switch etc etc.. but when I had the dash out it was going into the back of the stereo, it looked like an effort from someone who knew what they were doing but I cant help but think this is the problem, need to do further investigations but will try all of the above.

Electrical problems are the worst, i'd rather it be a blown head =\

yeah a perm live feed to a stereo would do it, if its not switching off. mk1 dont have ign live feed as standard so radio will on all the time till you switch it off!