Battery dies after 3-4 weeks

Hello all

For the last six to eight months now I have been having issues with the battery dying every three to four weeks. The car will just "die"

The strange thing is that there is no and I repeat, no drain on the battery that I can find
The electrician and I are at a loss after repeatedly checking, testing, kicking the poor girl
We have checked all the door switches, the alarm system... The only thing that may be an issue is the Glow Plug Relay (PRC6913) which seems to work fine but the relay board seemed to have come lose and the electrician fixed it but said that a replacement is needed.
Thing is, that every time we check the car for an electrical drain nothing comes up.

After switching to the 3rd battery and checking the alternator repeatedly for any faults I have concluded that those are not at fault.

Any ideas guys? Anything that I may be missing?

cheers

Check the instrument that your using for testing it my be faulty, there will be a very small amount of current draining from the battery by the security ECU. So after 4 weeks of standby the battery wouldn't have enough voltage to start the engine,but then a quick charge and your away or I am... and depending on the batteries condition even after 2 or 3weeks it's flat.

The glow plug relay is ignition switched therefore if faulty will give difficult starting, maybe.

get a halfrauds to test the battery it may just be old enough to not hold it's charge. If your short on cash for a new battery then get a £10 solar panel battery charger from maplins and leave it hooked up in the day. I did this exactly this with my cav when the battery would die during the week of it sitting on my drive the solar panel kept enough charge in it even without direct sun to allow it to start on the weekends. I now have a new battery and all is good

Hi guys,

Thanks for the replies thus far.

The Multimeters and Load Testers are fine since I had the car checked at two different car electricians on different several occasions including my own test at home.
The amount of current used while the car is locked ('security ECU' is in use) or unlocked for that matter is minimal. The electricians say that it is within normal (low end) parameters.

The car seems to be fine but then every 3rd or 4th week it just won't start.

BTW: The weather here is amazing so cold is a none issue

Have you checked the Alternator?
Doh !! Scratch that

Hi Bromsgrove Defender,

Ye, checked the Alternator Actually, about a year and a half ago I replaced the rectifier and had the "works-over" done to the Alternator. So, I am confident that the alternator is in good working condition also since I have checked it about 20-30 times in the past few months

The battery is in good working order since it is only 2 months old and is the 3rd Battery in the past 6 months. The 3rd battery because the 1st battery was obviously getting old and the 2nd battery was replaced by the 3rd battery ( ) as a precautionary measure to ensure that I am excluding the battery as been faulty. The battery has also been tested about 20-30 times in the past few months... ' and breeeaaaath'

cheers

Hi Jim I( had the same problem my battery kept going flat I took it to the shop that I bought it from and they only sell battery's so they know what they are talking about.They took the car in for a drain test and could find no drain any where but it still kept going flat so they put a brand new battery on and bingo its not let me down since.They where not surprised they said that although they did a drain test and could find nothing wrong sometimes a faulty battery will not always show up on a test but the real test is the starting up of the car as this really tests the battery's state hope this helps

Hi tobytess,

So, basically change the battery again

cheers

Jim W. said:

Hello all

For the last six to eight months now I have been having issues with the battery dying every three to four weeks. The car will just "die"

The strange thing is that there is no and I repeat, no drain on the battery that I can find
The electrician and I are at a loss after repeatedly checking, testing, kicking the poor girl
We have checked all the door switches, the alarm system... The only thing that may be an issue is the Glow Plug Relay (PRC6913) which seems to work fine but the relay board seemed to have come lose and the electrician fixed it but said that a replacement is needed.
Thing is, that every time we check the car for an electrical drain nothing comes up.

After switching to the 3rd battery and checking the alternator repeatedly for any faults I have concluded that those are not at fault.

Any ideas guys? Anything that I may be missing?

cheers

Click to expand...

first off, which disco model is it?
second, is it a daily drive motor, or just used at weekends?
third, when it dies, does it just cut out and refuse to start, or is there a gradual loss of power (electrically) until it wont start?
fourth, has your electrician done any testing while the battery's in its "failed" state? (voltage static, voltage running, charge current while running, drop test)
finally, where abouts in the world are you?

nrgserv said:

first off, which disco model is it?
second, is it a daily drive motor, or just used at weekends?
third, when it dies, does it just cut out and refuse to start, or is there a gradual loss of power (electrically) until it wont start?
fourth, has your electrician done any testing while the battery's in its "failed" state? (voltage static, voltage running, charge current while running, drop test)
finally, where abouts in the world are you?

Click to expand...

First - 1997 Disco 1, two door. Manual. No ABS. Has factory security system. Has aftermarket radio/CD player.

Second - daily driver but now not so much since it is not reliable atm.

Third - the car never "dies" on me while operating, it just won't start after 3rd-4th week. The car seems fine at first then it starts to hesitate a little at start-ups (I can tell but other none Disco. drivers can't I guess) then by 3rd to 4th week it is more apparent that the battery is starting to lose power then poof it won't start; drrrr, tit-tat, tit-tat, drrrrr, tick, tick, tick dead!

Fourth - yes, yes, yes and yes as far as I know.
I even went over there today and went over these same questions with him and he reassured me that all the above have been done. He comes highly recommended and is not taking the **** because out of the 6 times I have been to his shop and 2 times he personally came to my house for on the spot (failed state) inspections (car stayed in twice: once for 3 days and one other time for 2 days) he only accepted payment once 30EUs and keeps on telling me that when he finds the problem I can pay him.
The car is not showing ANY signs of parasitic draw and that is what has confounded us for so long.
I even got a 2nd opinion today but got the same answer: "I can't find anything wrong with the car. We will have to just go through trial and error etc., etc."

Finally - Cyprus

PS. I yanked out the Glow Plug Relay connector and will test to see if that has anything to do with it.

what's this 3/4 week refer to?

does that mean you leave it alone for 3/4 weeks and it fails to start.. or that even thought you drive it everyday, by the 3/4 week it fails to start and you need to recharge it?

also whats the batt ah?

nrgserv said:

fourth, has your electrician done any testing while the battery's in its "failed" state? (voltage static, voltage running, charge current while running, drop test)

Click to expand...

Jim W. said:

Fourth - yes, yes, yes and yes as far as I know.

Click to expand...

figures please
(ask your sparky for them)

trax said:

also whats the batt ah?

Click to expand...

and trax's question, tho I wasn't bothered about that just yet

I have it as a daily driver but ever since I have this issue I do not take the old girl far or that often. This problem occurs even though I drive her regularly or not.

Battery specs: Amp. Hr (20HR) 55
RC 90
CCA (-18C) 475

When I go to the electrician again I will ask for the numbers


cheers

Jim W. said:

I have it as a daily driver but ever since I have this issue I do not take the old girl far or that often. This problem occurs even though I drive her regularly or not.

Battery specs: Amp. Hr (20HR) 55
RC 90
CCA (-18C) 475

When I go to the electrician again I will ask for the numbers


cheers

Click to expand...

i thought discos were 072's cca 570 and 70ah.

if it's happening even when you drive it daily.. then i'd be wondering if the battery is just slowly discharging through use and it's not getting charged.

so your batt seems way too small to me.. but nm

is your alt working correctly? 14.4v when running across the batt terms.

are you driving long enough periods to recharge the battery?

I'm assuming you don't have a drain/short.

Since the batt is small, you are using a lot of juice to start your beasty.. if you then drive 20 mins down the road the alt won't have time to recharge it back up.

repeat this for a few weeks and you end up with a slowly drained battery.

However, this is the most basic of basic stuff.. if it turns out to be this then your electrician is a waste of space.

Well, I unplugged the Glow Plug relay and it seems that all is well for the time being. I need to do more testing. Basically I need more time to see ;-)

On another note:
After taking a closer look at the body and chassis I noticed that one side is higher than the other side. About 2cms off.
I measured from rear wheel arch to center of rim (axle) and it is 49.2cms and on the right (rear) side it is 47.3cms. The car measurements were taken while the car was on level ground on several different occasions.

Should I place shims (spacers) in the right hand side body mounts to offset the tilt? What is the best way to proceed with this?

cheers

Jim W. said:

I have it as a daily driver but ever since I have this issue I do not take the old girl far or that often. This problem occurs even though I drive her regularly or not.

Battery specs: Amp. Hr (20HR) 55
RC 90
CCA (-18C) 475

When I go to the electrician again I will ask for the numbers


cheers

Click to expand...

Hi mate, well you might not like to hear it but your battery is too small, it just doesn't have enough 'beef' !

I would suggest that you to replace this 'mini' battery for something with the following minimum spec:

80amp/hr

700cca

thebiglad said:

Hi mate, well you might not like to hear it but your battery is too small, it just doesn't have enough 'beef' !

I would suggest that you to replace this 'mini' battery for something with the following minimum spec:

80amp/hr

700cca

Click to expand...

To be totally honest thebiglad I really do want to change my mini battery.
I don't like the fact that it is smaller than intended and would like to install some driving/fog lights at some point and this battery just won't do.

cheers

Jim W. said:

To be totally honest thebiglad I really do want to change my mini battery.
I don't like the fact that it is smaller than intended and would like to install some driving/fog lights at some point and this battery just won't do.

cheers

Click to expand...

Might I suggest a Numax 1000mca battery from Tanya batteries - costs about £65 from memory.

Thank for the input guys.
I am still having the same problem with my car. Do you guys really think it's the battery being to "small"?
I mean even with the car sitting for a month (maybe started it and ran it a few places 2-3 times at the beginning of the month) the battery still dies.
I am getting frustrated with this

Bigger battery and optimate