Optima dead, trying to find problem, help!

[navyflyer72]

OK here was the situation:

mY 67 Camaro is finally running, took her for a drive up to Annapolis (about 25 miles away) at about the 20 mile mark I pull up to a red light and scan the gauges, I notice the temp gauge moving rapidly past 200, I figure I might need to get the car moving and get some air moving through her (it was a hot summer day and I didn't hear the fan), light turns green, I start moving, temp approaching 250, so I decide to pull into next parking lot. I never make it. Entire car goes dead, no lights no nothing. I find a burnt main power fuse (50 amp) and a little coolant had spurted out of overflow. I have an aluminum be cool radiator with a Mark VIII fan with the DC controller, the surge protector on the DC controller was burned through. I am close enough to a parts store to walk and get few new 50 Amp fuses, replace it and find the batt is dead and can't jump her. I get the Camaro picked up and delivered home on a flat bed. After trying, unsuccessfully, to charge the battery, I take it in and buy a new one... new one works for awhile then sits for 2 weeks and won't start, same deal, won't take a charge, I have it replaced under warranty. I put in the new one tonight, car starts and runs, but I disconnect the batt cables after running her.

I want to go through the entire electrical system to try and find what is draining the battery, how do I perform a resistance check on each circuit (with battery disconnected) or if there is a better way to isolate a battery drain problem, how?

Also, I have electic life windows, and with car running they will only roll up about 1/2 - 3/4 before they slowly stop and can't roll all the way up, any ideas what cold be causing this? I am guessing the windows are binding in the channels, but could something else be causing this? Thanks for any help.

[MonzaRacer]

Sounds like you have a drain, get one of the battery disconnect switch for about $8to$10 then you put it on one of the cable ends , run the car, then you hook a DMM(digital Multimeter) with a 10 amp scal and milliamps tooto the wire and the terminal.
then seperate them and read it, if you have more than 250milliamps, or 1/4 of an amp your definately getting a drain, the first thing I would look for are any automatic lights(doors,glove box, alternator)or 12v turned on circuit.
If you have a 10 si alternator unplug it, as some times they will stay turned on, if its a self excited(ie has no 12 volt key on wire or loop overto the other plug terminal) it can stay on.
also you may also have the power wire that the alt feeds power through placed wrong. make an 8 guage wire to the battery positive nad see if system voltage goes up.
also your car needs to run at least 13.9 to 15 volts (actaul indusrty "spec" is 13.9 to 14.6) and the voltage should never drop morethan a volt and the amps should increase as loads go up and figure your car would probably run with anywhere from 10 to 20 amps steady charging.
The thing is you need to use a good multimeter with amps channel, and start pulling fuses and unplugging things till it drops. Have a friend watch the meter.
Also if your battery dies over a period of time you may need a trickle charger to keep it up.
Also if a battery dies and stays down it will be junk pretty quick. Even an optima.

[rob07002]

Voltage regulator. Had same thing, voltage drain.

[B Schein]

I have had the same poblems with optimas once they get draned dead the will not take a charge anyone know why that is.

[MonzaRacer]

Any battery regardless of construction left dead will take a memory set if not recharged soon. Usually Optimas are pretty reliable and rarely give issues but severe draining and lack of recharging can destroythem.
But I dorve multiple times thanksgiving weekend and about 500 miles or so at night on several days with the alternator wire broken and the alternator not charging the battery.

[megaladon6]

all the above. i'd pay particular attention to the fan wiring since the surge protector burned.

[matty b]

easy way on early car to check for a draw is to turn off absolutely everything and close the doors. if you happens to have an underhood light unplug it. Disconnect the negative battery cable and put a test light in between the cable terminal and the battery terminal. If the light is on you have a draw, if you dont no draw. If you do get the light on the process is actually very simple. Start unplugging fuses, if you pull one and the light goes out then you found your problem circuit. Then you need to go to each component and unplug them after you reinserted the fuse. If at that point its still on then the wiring is shorted to ground. What concerns me is that you burned battery inputs, Id start looking at the forward lamp harness from the battery to the bulkhead, If the tape looks melted you probably screwed something up and its shorted causing the draw. When I say look at it I mean the whole length even the parts that are hidden behind the wheel well and across the core support. Im fixing a 70 chevelle that made it back from New Mexico but the alternator lead shorted where it rubbed on the core support and burned through cause the previous owner replaced the fuse link with wire. New owner though he had a bad alternator when in fact he had a fire hazard!!

[navyflyer72]

Thanks for all the info. I am going to have to do my own troubleshooting, since a bunch of wiring was done by a guy 150 miles away, so driving to him to get it rechecked would be just the thing a fire hazard needs to burn my baby to the ground... I will run a few of these tests myself before I try driving anywhere.

[Zedzag]

I have the DC FK35 running my dual LS1 fans and my battery went dead within two weeks right after the DC controller was installed. I'm not good with electronics so I had a friend of mine who's quite good (has his own electronics repair business) wire it up for me. I don't drive the car often so now I just unhook the battery. I haven't tried to troubleshoot the problem yet but my buddy does know what he's doing,the instructions were simple to read and well laid out, and the car has had no history of killing the battery in two weeks time(I've had the car for 14yrs). I rule out the DC controller as it is new but after seeing this post, it makes me wonder......

[navyflyer72]

I am not the best with electrical either, but I took a shot at wiring the entire car with a pailess 18 circuit harness and weatherpak terminals, so it is entirely possible that I screwed up the wiring, but I hahd to have the RS headlight relay setup professionally wired because I just could not get it working right (turned out I had a bad brand-new headlight switch to throw into the mix - which would have taken me a year to figure out). So now who knows where the culprit lies. I have the main 0 gauge power wire coming from the trunk mounted battery, goes through the interior into the passenger kickpanel vent area. I used a DS&E firewall terminal, but I think that my crimp on the interior side may be loose causing heat and excessive draw, any way that I can isolate this without having to remove the kick panel?

btw, have I said lately how much I respect electricians! They are on the same level as good bodywork guys, unbelievable patience.

Also keep in mind, three things burned during this episode all in separate areas of the engine compartment, but I think they may all be on the headlight section of the harness, gotta check the schematic:

1) The DC Controller surge protector
2) The Headlight fuse
3) The main 50A power fuse

[MonzaRacer]

Ok as for me as a techncian I have my way of doing electrical work and so far it keeps me out of trouble with comebacks.
when crimping you need to use the non insulated connectors and then use rgualr shrink tubing to insulate it.
Reasons for this is because too many people just flat crimp a terminal and this doesnt lock the wire in.
If you lookat any good crimper it has the non unsulated spot and this has a valley or u shape on one side and a nipple or pin that goes intot the terminal.
Now I actually prefer to buy terminals that you can see the split in as you can use those on larger wire if your low on terminals and that split goes into the valley of the crimper, the pin pushes in the other side and locks wthe wire in then I solder the connection but try to only solder down into the crimp, it helps lock it in and provides a near perfect electrical connection.
For older wiring I actually use Oatey liquid flux used for plumbing. But you need to clean it good after or the chemicals can damage wire overtime if its cheap wire or has a lot of cotaminants(I think this is why the older Ford wores all strip back and are black).
I have my very large Digi-Key cataloge open and you can even buy the shrink tube with the adhesive(much better) inside as it hot glues the tubing to the terminal.
A couple of companies make the crimp and seal termials that have low heat solder in them too but it olny works on new clean wire of a decent grade.
But when I got int ocars my electrical was good but my connections have progressively gotten better and more reliable.
I guess I need to do some actual professional connections by hand so you guys can see it.
Now a machine crimp is much better as it has a special setup tension and does pretty much as good as my hand done units.
I still will solder some of the sensore and actuator connections if I feel I am having a connection issue.
I use to use a $200 crimper but had issues with it and went back to my $25.00 Matco units rust and all.
Lee Abel
AFTERMARKET PERFORMANCE