heres one for you!

[samwatson]

right saturday night coming home batt light licks on off. on off etc only as pull abay. anyhow get home as short journey.

 

look and the alternator to starter pos wire has cut the outer insulator on a bracket and is arcing the possitive to the chassis (earth) so i turn batt off andf insulate the outer of the cable as temp measure befor i get a new wire asap. anyhow i check it starts. starts fine no warning lights up.

 

monday come out- batt is flat. put a spare on runs fine (thought other was flat as possibly not been charging sat night) so put orrigional on charge

 

tue morning went to start batt is flat. put the freshly charged origional bat on and runs fine so i go to get a new wire incase mine has a rissistance built up in it.

 

wed fitted the other batt as origional is flat and put the new wire on.

 

thurs batt flat again! call aa and they say both batts are dead as give out power fine but don't take charge. so i use a 3rd good battery as checked by aa and they say its fine. so put it on and was fine yesterday. he checked alternator as well saying its charging fine. 13.4

 

tis morning (friday) come out batt flat again. aa man called and now waiting

 

 

 

 

 

Right so any of you lot recon you know what could have gone wrong. my first though is that its reversed the pollarity on the alternator and sodded it up.? or a massive battery drain???? but nothing is left on and checked all the earth wires and they seam fine any ideas?!?! ta sam

[shawdreamer]

Right so any of you lot recon you know what could have gone wrong.

 

you developed dyslexia at a young age?

 

oh you mean about the car!

 

the charging system is a relatively simple system with very few things that can actually go wrong.

 

try checking to see if there's a large variance in voltage level between the alternator and battery while the car is running using a multimeter.

 

the general rule is if there's a notable difference (1volt or over) you have a problem somewhere along the main charging cables (you mentioned a damaged cable....maybe its damaged at multiple points?), if the voltage is more or less the same then the likelihood is your battery being fubar'd and not excepting a charge.

 

other worthy notes...

 

check main earthing points around the battery (there should be a chunky one thats quite near the battery negative, make sure its solid still)

 

you mentioned you alternator was pushing out 13.4v, thats relatively low, the norms atleast above 14v for a healthy alt, 13.4v probably drops to around the 12.4v mark when you turn your lights on which means your batteries getting feckall charge.

 

have you added anything to the cars electrical system lately.... car alarm, remote locking, electric windows?

Edited October 11, 2013 by shawdreamer

[SteveB]

Right so any of you lot recon you know what could have gone wrong.

 

you developed dyslexia at a young age?

 

oh you mean about the car!

 

the charging system is a relatively simple system with very few things that can actually go wrong.

 

try checking to see if there's a large variance in voltage level between the alternator and battery while the car is running using a multimeter.

 

the general rule is if there's a notable difference (1volt or over) you have a problem somewhere along the main charging cables (you mentioned a damaged cable....maybe its damaged at multiple points?), if the voltage is more or less the same then the likelihood is your battery being fubar'd and not excepting a charge.

 

other worthy notes...

 

check main earthing points around the battery (there should be a chunky one thats quite near the battery negative, make sure its solid still)

 

you mentioned you alternator was pushing out 13.4v, thats relatively low, the norms atleast above 14v for a healthy alt, 13.4v probably drops to around the 12.4v mark when you turn your lights on which means your batteries getting feckall charge.

 

have you added anything to the cars electrical system lately.... car alarm, remote locking, electric windows?

 

Minimum charge voltage is 13.8, so as said with 13.4 you're putting nothing in and the battery will go flat. Ideally you want to see 14.2.

 

You may have blown a diode in the alternator if it was shorting out.

[samwatson]

ok turns out the alternator is draining the battery. so changed the alternator. the wires have already been changed. hopefully this hasn't murdered another battery! battery's on charge so we'll see in a bit!