Spent this morning sorting out some electrical gremlins with Carlos.
We've struggled with a parasitic drain since buying back in December, although it's been a bit difficult to figure out. Before my parents bought the car we put a brand new Bosch battery on since the old one wasn't holding charge at all and was a cheap old unit. The stereo also had a switch underneath that someone had fitted, which I automatically presumed was because the stereo was draining the battery. The previous owner had put an aftermarket SatNav system in, and then just thrown in a standard CD player to sell it, including that switch. Unfortunately for me, this guy had no idea what he was doing. We also tested the battery for a drain before my parents bought it but the only current we found being drawn was 0.02A, which isn't anything that'd drain a battery super quickly. So, we left it to monitor it.
We've also been having fun with the aerial. The current aerial on the car isn't the one it came with from factory, and neither is the stereo. They're both standard SEAT units but not the ones the car came with, as I found out after calling the dealer yesterday. The car came with a Nav aerial but not a Nav stereo (which even the guy at the dealer said was strange), it came with a Bluetooth stereo. The cables for the aerial don't fit the base that's on the car, so at the moment my parents are limited to BBC Radio 1 (occasionally) and Radio 2, as it can't pick up any local stations. The Nav aerial that should be on the car costs £115, and a normal aerial costs... £16. Ordered the normal aerial which should be coming on Monday, so hopefully my parents can listen to more than two stations!
Now, back to that battery drain. For the first few weeks, everything was fine, the car started up fine and it seemed like the drain was gone. My dad took the switch out and it seemed to make no difference. Over time however, it began to get worse. My mum would come home from work on a Friday afternoon and park Carlos up, then my dad (who works nights) would come to use it Sunday night and the battery would be totally dead. Luckily we live at the top of a fairly steep hill so it was easily bump started, but it's not the nicest way to get the car going again. Eventually, it got to the point where leaving Carlos for barely 24 hours would cause the battery to be completely flat. A few days ago I had to get up early and go to my dad's work and help get it started because it was flat.
So today was the day I'd (hopefully) try and sort whatever it was that was killing poor Carlos...
The lower wiring with the big red wire is the mess the previous owner left behind for the stereo.
The red wire had been used for the switch for the live feed, so I took that out and connected the original wires back together. I suspect the previous owner thought the drain was coming from the live feed, and stuck that switch in there. There's also another unnecessary wire, the smaller black one, which I have no idea what was for. The pin it was connected to in the plug wasn't an original pin, and the wire ran along to the fuse board but wasn't actually connected to anything in there. I took it out, but still left some wire in the plug in case we find it was for something and need to connect it back up.
And now for what I believe/hope was the actual drain...
A black and blue wire that had been chopped, and a random live feed stuck in there. This is the plug for the Climatronic/heater controls, not the radio. Unfortunately the laptop at work with all the specialist software isn't working at the moment so I wasn't able to find a wiring diagram for the Climatronic (Google only brought up the older Climatronic in the first Leon) and find out what that live feed was for, because I connected the black and blue wires back up and it all works fine without that live connected. I tested the live with a probe and it's a constant live even with the keys out of the ignition, so that must've been something to do with the drain. But it looks like a factory live, since the loom didn't look to be tampered with, so it's a bit of a mystery. I'll speak with the auto electrician on Monday and see if he has any wiring diagrams I can look at. For now, here's the plug neatened up and the live taped up.
Put it all back together (and replaced a few trim screws that were missing
) and tested everything out, and everything works fine so far.
Put the battery on charge, cleaned inside and out while I was waiting, job done. Fingers crossed this will be the end of Carlos' battery woes and my unwanted early starts rescuing him...
