battery drain

[xxxmike]

after leaving my 1.4 sport for 4 days i went to start it and its dead. Doesnt turn over at all.
Its a new battery and was fine the week before.
I will do a few tests over the bank holiday weekend and try and find out where the drain is coming from but as far as i can initially tell there wasnt anyting left on.

I have seen a few posts where the ECU needed a software update and this cured it.

SEAT in Brighton have never heard of this fault but plenty of people on other forums have said it fixed theirs.

Anyone here had that issue?

thanks

 

[RUM4MO]

What age or year of reg is your SEAT Ibiza 1.4, it might just be the BCM that needs its software corrected/updated.

Ie J519 software or patch "30eb" - J519 is the circuit ident for the BCM.

Of course it might be that something is faulty, my original SEAT dealer failed off the steering sensor that lives under the steering wheel which I thought might just be a wild guess - well that repair lasted about a month before things went back to being as before, ie leave car for 5 days - heavily discharged battery - it took me forcing my next SEAT dealer to consider it was just a software issue before things moved forward, from start to finish sorting this out took over a year! Three months on I'm still logging voltage daily using a remote lead to make sure that this problem is sorted out for good!!

 

[xxxmike]

It's a 2010 one
Thanks for your reply. I was reading your detailed issues earlier, massive 7 page write up about it all. Did seem that they took their time.
One of the technicians at Brighton SEAT did mention there was a patch for a battery drain issue. Earliest date to get in there is 3/5.
My power steering pump went a while ago too which I think is caused by the battery having a low voltage as it's a electric hydraulic pump.
I've raised a case with SEAT to have the update done for free, I work in IT and write basic coding and explained that the coding if wrong belongs to Seat and not me so it's their responsibility to keep this updated free of charge
Let's see how that goes.

Thanks.

 

[RUM4MO]

Good luck with getting it fixed FOC, I think that the process goes like this:- SEAT tech scan car for faults, ie investigative diagnosis > if NFF they will check their locally held or UK held database of outstanding actions for that car > that will probably reveal that there are no outstanding corrective action due for that car > that should trigger that tech requesting assistance from SEAT worldwide in the form of him raising this problem and waiting for responses, SEAT normal get back within 48 hours and will direct him to where he can find the fix.

Costs tend to be one hour tech time roughly £100 followed by only the time taken to find and download and the fix and verify that it has worked, in my case roughly 20>30 minutes, so another £50 roughly.

The supplied software will be free, is that will keep SEAT out of trouble!

Now, using any existing form of VW group etc car scan tools, you will not detect any change in the BCM's software version etc, which can be a bit annoying as the tech applying this change will never get confirmation if that fix has been applied correctly - and because of this, he could apply it 20 times and be none the wiser if it has already been applied - which to me as a retired test engineer does seem a bit lame - "configuration control" - does not seem to be a term that VW group understand, if they could, all these cars would have been fixed while still within the dealership servicing loop - idiots!

Edit:- what prompted this, ie did you own that car for some time and it was okay, then you started having trouble with a flattened battery, or have you just bought it and discovered that it had this problem?

Another Edit:- I think that you can rest assured that this problem has not influenced how or when the steering pump failed, there is adequate built in protection to disable the steering pump if the voltage goes low - really just to preserve other more important functions like engine control and mandated lighting.

 

[xxxmike]

It's going to be a challenge
I thought telling them I want it done free was a good starting point. Theb they can haggle down if needed and charge me a decent price.

Owned the car for a year now. It's always been spot on and used for a mix of journeys.

It all happened when I got rear ended when stationary and the car went into the local body shop cowboys who did an awful job. When I picked it up it was hammering down with rain and the car didn't start. Battery completely flat. They jumped it and I noticed I didn't have power steering and thought it would come back after a good charge. Charged the battery to a pull 12.6V and with it running it was 14.5v so charging system working. Still no power steering.
Used my van and went back to the SEAT after 3 days and flat again and it was a new battery put on.
Grrrr

 

[RUM4MO]

Strange? I was sure that this Ibiza I am running, owned by my daughter who is working in KL, had not had any issues in this respect, then it started failing to have enough charge to start it if left for maybe a week, as you have read the other thread that I posted in I'll leave out the rest of the story but I will say that it did sound that this issue "appeared" out of nowhere - now that does not sound like a software issue, but applying that software update/patch sorted it out so far!

In an ideal world, if a product had a software "weakness" that did not send and keep most of the controllers powered down when not needed, you would expect that battery discharging issue to exist from day one, but in my case and some others, not so! Very strange?

 

[xxxmike]

Electrical systems are not my strong point but I thought I would have a look at a few bits.
You seem so much more clued up than me could you answer this question for me

Thought I would have a look and see if a particular fuse or component was drawing power.

So I charged up the battery fully to around 12.4v
Disconnected the negative terminal and put the positive from my multimeter on the actual negative lead. Then put the negative from the multimeter on the negative terminal. The multimeter was set to 200m ADC had all the doors closed but it just read 0. What did I do wrong?

 

[RUM4MO]

If that meter has protection, you will have blown the series fuse for the current ranges.

There will always be a current surge when you make that circuit, that is the very reason why I waited until the car had "gone to sleep" with doors closed and bonnet open, before connecting my meter, using a big crock clip to the earth side of the negative lead, used a large spike probe down through the open end of the negative lead, then loosened and slid the negative end up off the battery so that there was always a complete circuit and so no surge current.

Edit:- if that meter still works on volts, connect it across the battery and leave it connected, after maybe 10 minutes the battery voltage should increase a bit due to the controllers having shut down and so very little load on battery.

 

[Alan Kyp]

Just my thoughts, you say problems started after you got rear ended and the battery was flat on collection....
Have you checked all wiring in the boot for possible damage, are all the lights working correctly and is the boot lamp switching off when you close the tailgate


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[RUM4MO]

Good point, we should never lose sign of the obvious or easy reasons for this happening, the first thing that I did was to remove the boot light!

Before I fixed my mind on this probably being a BCM software issue, I checked a huge amount of other possibilities.

Edit:- for me, and maybe same in this case, it was the apparent random timing of this starting to happen that made it look like it had nothing to do with BCM software issues - but in my case it looks like that was the issue, or, adding the SEAT patch/update stopped this occurring, well from January 5th 2017! The battery drain records that I have, started back in June 1st 2016 which was just after my first SEAT dealer replaced the steering sensor under the steering wheel, that made things okay for about 6 weeks, then back to normal draining battery intermittently! Oh and the big disappointment of a heavily discharged car battery as an unwanted "welcome" on our return from a week in Italy in early September, luckily I had a booster pack in the boot as it was that car that I left at the airport, not nice after a very early start at Lake Como!

 

[xxxmike]

Hi guys,
Thanks for the additional comment there Alan. I think i will get it up in the air and have a look at the back end.
They removed the bumper and installed some new bits so i suppose its possible that a wire is damaged in the back somewhere causing the drain?

I picked up a 10 pack of 200ma fuses from Maplins. Popped a new one in and pop it blew again and the car was left off for a while.
I will try it the way you did it this lunch time-
"using a big crock clip to the earth side of the negative lead, used a large spike probe down through the open end of the negative lead, then loosened and slid the negative end up off the battery so that there was always a complete circuit and so no surge current."

I received a call back from SEAT UK who as i expected pretty much just shrugged their shoulders at me and said its my fault.

The whole ECU firmware going wrong issue randomly is a very possible one. I work in IT and there is an issue out there with CISCO routers where they go into lock down after 18months. Its a fault in the coding that causes it. CISCO are aware of this, so that senario is highly plausible that its coding that's the issue.

 

[xxxmike]

so little update.
My multi-meter wasn't man enough to take it. Borrowed one from work.

Set it up as normal and put it on the highest setting - 20 A!
draw was 0.35a! Massive!
This was after it was left with all door closed for 15-20 mins.

I took out the fuses one by one but it only fluctuated by 0.1a here and there, i was expecting it to drop by a long way. Even with the ECU fuses removed.

Maybe i did something wrong. I will repeat the test this afternoon as it was getting late and dark last night so may have missed something.

Any thoughts RUM4MO??

thanks

 

[RUM4MO]

You are making sure that you are routing the current through the meter without initially breaking the circuit of the battery to the car, if so:- try removing the medium sized lead from the battery top fuse/distribution area, that lead only feeds all internal stuff so will extrude things with a permanent feed like the power steering and maybe some other stuff.

When I did that, the current drain dropped to near as damn it zero.

Also you would remove all the fuses from the main visible fusebox - taking notes of positions and a picture first! That should also drop the drain, with the medium sized big lead bolted back on.

I just moved that medium sized big lead across to the next position which was vacant in petrol engine lower model Ibiza.

Edit:- I wrote in my notes "heavy red lead from SA-3" as being the lead that I was removing to check for drain elsewhere.

"Next, I removed all the fuses that are always live or live as soon as the door is opened, ie before ignition is on, from the under dashboard fuse box. Namely 23, 24, 42, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 54."

Check up on the internet and make sure that you know which fuse position is which.

You can check which ones are live with ignition off by probing them - with a sharp spike - there are two exposed points on the top of each fuse, or if open ones, anywhere on the top of them.

I'm guessing if you dropped the meter range down a few scales that reading would drop down to 1??ma or so - well at least down a bit.

 

[xxxmike]

that may be where i went wrong then. I disconnected the negative lead from the battery then set it up so i would have broken the circuit. So i have to get the red probe on the negative wire to the battery and have the black probe on the negative battery terminal and then slide the negative clip off?

I will take a picture and pull all the fuses at lunch time.
thanks

 

[xxxmike]

Making headway! Hows this looking.

https://ibb.co/cFeBJ5

 

[xxxmike]

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[RUM4MO]

Good, that is more like it, I think that my Ibiza went well below that, but most people thought that less than 100ma was good.

Now if that is with all the fuses back in, that means that the BCM can force the unwanted supplies to go to sleep - but the question is, do they stay asleep - if the battery is still draining quite a bit over a day, then you still have what might be a software issue.

I'll give you a sample of the voltages that I am recording by fitting a long lead from the battery to outside the bonnet, then leaving the car for days unused and locked up with bonnet closed starting from the day after last using the car:- day 01 V = 12.56V day 02 V = 12.50V day 03 V = 12.47V day 04 V = 12.44V day 05 V = 12.43V day 06 V = 12.42V day 07 V = 12.42V .
So that might give a feel for what to expect from a good battery discharging slowly - as intended while all unwanted supplies have kept asleep.

 

[xxxmike]

This is with everything plugged back in.
With no fuses in i was getting 0.02a. I was trying to get anything lower than 50ma so happier with this.

I noticed that the fuses when removed (the mini blade ones) were slightly discoloured on the silver ends. They were a light brown colour. Never seen that before on any other vehicles unless the fuse was blown and got hot.

A reading tonight shows i have 12.69v so will see how it is in the morning. I will be going away for 4 days and taking my van so the SEAT will be staying at home. Will be interesting to see if it discharges too much again over that time and if the bits go to sleep as they should.
The car is booked into SEAT Brighton on 3rd May so will have to see.

Now onto the next drama of sorting out the brake lights being on constantly. Silly little cars!

thanks for your advice and help, especially with the fuse layout and description. There seem to be so many fuses that are a constant live. More than necessary really.

 

[RUM4MO]

I'd hope/think that that tarnishing you have noticed will be down to moisture etc.

My wife's August 2015 Polo 6C - ie the latest version, has a serious number of fuses and very few covered by the owner's handbook, for the rest "talk to your dealer" - very handy when you are away in the middle of nowhere with a function not working!!

Edit:- I'll be keeping my eyes open for what was found wrong with the brake light circuit, I seem to remember some found it was the switch and some found it was a wire, I might have another look for that thread to see if the wire issue makes sense and if I can see the potential of the same thing happening with my late 2009 Ibiza.

 

[xxxmike]

as i look at the master cylinder there is a 4 wire plug that goes into the bottom of it. I removed the air box to get a better view but still couldnt see where a sensor goes. i did see a torx head bolt there so its possible the 4 wire plug comes off and then i undo that torx bit. I will speak to a mate who is ex VW tech and see what he says about it.