hey guys,

I have a 2005 G35 Coupe.

I have had it for 3 years and it has run with no problems.

As of 3 weeks ago, the car won't start and there is no power. Checking the battery, it has been drained. I got a new battery that same day and it ran normally for 1 week. I didn't drive it for 2 days, and on the day after that, the car wouldnt start and the battery was dead. Checked the battery again and it may have been bad, so got a new one. ONE week later, with the same circumstances, the car won't start= battery dead again.

I have taken it to 2 different shops and now its at the dealership, and no one seems to know the problem and can't figure it out.

They have checked all the batteries, the starter, the alternator, no one seems to know.

The only thing NOT stock about the car is the stereo, and that was disconnected.

Any suggestions or anyone have this problem before?

Thanks.

 

Hook up an ammeter to your battery. Notice how much power the car is drawing, and for the love of god, don't try to start the car with the ammeter connected or you will destroy it. I'm not sure what the normal draw is, but I'd guess it should be somewhere around 100mA (@100 milliamps, the entire 80 Amp hour battery would take about a month to go from full to discharged, which seems about right). If it takes you 2 days to drain a battery to empty, that would mean it's pulling on the order of 2 amps.

Anyway, with the ammeter hooked up, start pulling fuses, one by one, and check the reading for each one. When you see the current draw drop significantly, you've found your problem. Maybe you've got a small short to ground somewhere, or your aftermarket amp isn't really ever disabled, etc.

Good luck, these are a pain to chase.

 

All good advice...^...but I'd begin with the disconnected stero unit and check all those wires first, gotta be an open wire shorting out to drain the battery that quickly. Let us know when you find the answer...please! What are the odds of anyone at the dealership finding the answer?
Gary

 

That sucks man. I hope you can figure it out soon. That is funny Gary c! I don't think they can find the answer.

 

okay,

so after 5 days at the dealership, they said they found the problem. apparently the car seat mechanism (underneath the drivers seat) was causing a short. they said it was intermittently sucking energy and causing the drain.

they have quoted us $1600 (labor + parts) to replace the seat mechanism.

does this sound familiar to anyone? does it seem worth it?

 

Dealer's default behavior is just to replace everything. If you have time to kill, you could save a lot of money disassembling it yourself and seeing whether there's a frayed cable somewhere that's touching ground. It could be as simple as wrapping some electrical tape around it.

 

What happened to fixing something rather than just replacing it? Typical price gouge from the stealership, and a good example why we only go there for warranty work. Pay them what you owe them for their time and fix it yourself or that it somewhere else...$1600? Thanks for letting us know what they found!
Gary

 

Dealers don't fix, it's not their business model.

If you can't or aren't able to fix it yourself, try an audio shop.

They take seats and wiring apart and back together more than anyone.

 

ive heard of head units shorting out and staying "on" or if you have an aftermarket Amp i would say disconnect that as it could have bad resistors and cause it to drain (had that happen to me)