Battery drain problem

[cupra_matt]

Iam not Audi anymore since about a year ago. Mercedes now.

The OBD port should be above pedals, that area anyway iirc.

 

[johnmac]

sounds like youve eliminated this already but i had similar issues which turned out to be the courtesy light in the boot.

good luck finding your issue

Thanks traumapat, I'll post the final answer when I get to it. Meanwhile, progress is delayed as the car is away.
John

 

[johnmac]

Thanks to all for your interest and advice. I'll post progress when I can get at the car again.

 

[grotmeister]

Johnmac, here's a device for checking each circuit for current drain. Look at eBay item number 200302191868

good luck!

 

[johnmac]

Thank you, Grotmeister. I'll follow that up.
johnmac

 

[johnmac]

Hello everyone. Sorry to be away for so long. The local experts removed the radio and CD player and that seems to have done the trick. I don't really get it, as I took the fuses out and still got the drain, but anyway, now we have to find out what's amiss in the radio. I see there's a guy on eBay offering a fix for radio draining battery problems on another SEAT model for £70 a pop. Maybe it's a SEAT weakness.

Anyway, thank you all for your interest, good ideas, patience and modesty (isn't it endearing and true that the people who know most are the most understated about it?!).

Thanks again, and this is me signing off on this problem.

johnmac

 

[Simon Audi]

Hi Johnmac

Glad you got it sorted.

Regards

Simon

 

[traumapat]

thanks for posting the result.. id not heard of this before.

hope it stays sorted

 

[johnmac]

We finally traced the current drain to the CD player (standard SEAT single player that sits under the radio/cassette). The unit stayed on (intermittent) even when radio, ignition, etc. were turned off. I could not find any visible problem in the unit as far as I could strip it -- maybe a component in the power area, or a switch? Anyway, I've abandoned the search and am going to fit a different radio/CD player.

Thanks again to all who helped. The result may be useful or interesting to someone.

johnmac

 

[lunalupi]

That's useful to me - my Arosa has been stading for a little over two weeks now due to the snow and ice, but about a week and a half in I went to start him and the battery was flat!

Now as he has stood for several weeks before and still started on the button, the only thing I could think I had done differently was leaving the front on the headunit which I've never done before when I've known the car will be standing....

 

[johnmac]

Hi lunalupi -- it may be worth a try. It me ages to nail our problem. The Cd unit seems to take about 1A when a CD is loaded (no idea why), so a 32AH battery is going to run down in a couple of days. Bad!

johnmac

 

[vmx1200]

Hi

Glad you have sorted the problem, I had a problem with my daughters Arosa battery going flat but the problem was (I hope) a broken wire to the alternator ... the very fine one which I guess is the field connector. It is certainly charging now.

The reason for my reply is have you checked the drain now you have taken out the CD player, our Arosa has a flow of between 0.09 to 0.1 amp with everything off, by my reckoning a 32 amp/hr battery will be flat in 13 days, this doesn’t seem very long.

Regards

VMX1200

 

[johnmac]

Hi VMX1200

I haven't had a chance to check the normal drain current yet, but the guy at the local SEAT garage told me that it was normal for modern cars to drain flat in a week or less. He said they'd just had a brand new car in for delivery and needed the jump leads to get it started next morning. My view is that is total crap: they'd never sell any cars if they had that kind of problem. On the other hand, as my daughter's car had rarely been left for much more than a week without a run, it's not something I monitored until we hit this problem.
I'll let you know what I get on the meter as the "resting" current drain when I get a chance.

johnmac

 

[lunalupi]

The Arosa (Mk1 anyway) should last a good 2 weeks without charging - while I was at uni mine would often go that long without a drive, but then when we did go out I made sure we had a good run to get the battery charged again.

It's why it caught me out this time! I'd got so used to being able to get in after several weeks and he would still start...

 

[lunalupi]

Thought I would dig this thread out to let you know that my mk1 has just been stood for a good three weeks (possibly more), but still started first time today

So it seems that so long as you make sure there is nothing to drain the battery (I removed the headunit front) then they should last at least that long!