Car won't start - ideas/help... ***UPDATE - STILL FUBARRED!!***

[KarlBristol]

Well today I went to fire the car up for work and all I got was a series of clicks - the car didn't fire into action. The voltmeter was showing at below halfway so I presumed that the battery didn't have enough juice to fire into action.

A few facts that may or may not help diagnose...

- The battery was brand new a couple of weeks ago
- The car is placed on charge with a CTEK trickle charger when it's not in use
- The car struggled to start yesterday but as soon as it was on was fine. The internal voltmeter showed a lower than normal reading then as well but as soon as the car was on it was fine
- The alternator belt had been slipping so it was tightened. It was then slipping in the wet but this has been tightened several times and was charging the car fine - it shows that it's charging the battery on the volt meter in the car at around 14.5
- There have been no alternator lights of doom on the dash
- As I had concerns over the cars starting yesterday when I returned from a long drive I plugged it on charge but did not engage the alarm or immobiliser in case this had been sapping electricity. So it isn't this draining the battery...
- These issues have only recently started and nothing new has been altered or modified that I can think of that would effect the starting of the car

Ideas????
I need the car running yesterday as it's my daily drive

[stephenj]

Hi Karl

Is there a spark?
Have you checked the earths?
Have you checked your fuses (i.e. EFI fuse and other relevant circuits)
You could check the fuel pump is working too by shorting out out FP and B+ in the diagnostic plug.

Hope you get it sorted

Steve

[KarlBristol]

I'm pretty sure it's either a parasitic drain, an earth or the alternator/battery.

The car was sluggish to start yesterday but as soon as it was up and running it was fine. The engine sounded fine yesterday - thats what leads me to believe that it's charging/starting based. It's just not getting enough juice to start itself up, possibly as it's draining off somewhere

Took my multi-meter out there but the Amp facility on it seems to be packing up and wouldn't give any readings

Not a clue yet if it's an earth or fuse issue.
I've come in for 5 minutes and a cuppa as my fingers are about ready to drop off!!!

[thomp1983]

The stock voltage indicator is next to useless, if your battery has been low the ctek won't have had chance to do much overnight. You need to get it started then measure the voltage across the battery terminals, then go from there. Trying to do a drain test with a flat battery can also be misleading

Chris

[KarlBristol]

The stock voltage indicator is next to useless, if your battery has been low the ctek won't have had chance to do much overnight. You need to get it started then measure the voltage across the battery terminals, then go from there. Trying to do a drain test with a flat battery can also be misleading

Chris

Right... A bit of progress and some more explanations:

When I recently switched out my battery (probably just over a month ago) I kept my old one. Both are good quality Bosch S4 ones.

I switched it out as the car wasn't starting at the time and so I presumed that it was due to the fact that it's an old battery (probably 6-7 years old).

The car hasn't had an issue for this amount of time and has been being used almost daily (with the odd exception of a rest day here and there! )

I charged up my old battery following this incident today and switched it out for my new battery - the car started with the first turn of the key.... So I'm not exactly sure what's wrong

- new battery won't start the car
- new battery is reading at around 8.7V
- old battery has been charged up and plugged in. With the car running I've got exactly 14.0V (indicating that it isn't an alternator issue)
- with the car off the old battery is holding 12.21V
- I removed the positive terminal and did the Amp test to see how much is being lost parasitically but its showing 0

- I don't think I have any battery voltage loss when the car is off from the stereo, clock etc... As I have to reset them almost every time I get in the car indicating that they don't draw from the battery and only work when the cars on

- the alarm was off last night when the battery discharged itself



Due to the above I'm slightly perplexed... Ideas???

[KarlBristol]

I've now left the car with the alarm and immobiliser on (which it wasn't last night) and the battery charger not plugged in (when it was last night)


Could this be an earthing issue?

[stephenj]

Could it not just be a bad battery?

[KarlBristol]

Could it not just be a bad battery?

Potentially...
But it just seems a little odd as the battery is so new
And if it were a duff battery would I not have had issues from the first time I plugged it in

It could be that the old battery was old and dying and the new one is just duff but that seems a little too easy to be the case


I've already got a second earth on the negative battery terminal
I've only got the original earths on this engine block however I've got a HKS engine earthing set being imported from Japan at the moment but it will take around a month to get here... That will be any potential earthing issues sorted but I don't think my issues will stop there

[synXero]

Curveball - starter motor issues?

[KarlBristol]

Curveball - starter motor issues?

Would that cause the battery to discharge though?
Car starts fine with a full battery

[synXero]

Oh, I didn't click that.

If your battery is losing charge overnight it has to be a parasitic drain, no? It's unusual (and I hope wrong, since I've just bought one) but could your CTEK potentially be to blame...?

[stephenj]

If it was an earthing issue wouldn't you have the same problem no matter what battery you were using.

Get the new battery on charge whilst your tinkering and then see if it discharges, it cant hurt to check.

[KarlBristol]

If it was an earthing issue wouldn't you have the same problem no matter what battery you were using.

Get the new battery on charge whilst your tinkering and then see if it discharges, it cant hurt to check.

Yes - so potentially my old battery was perfectly healthy. But if that was the case why has it taken a month or more to discharge?

That's what I'm doing at the minute - one battery on charge and one in the car. If it's discharged by tomorrow I will switch it over and keep doing the same until I work out what the issue is.....

Tbh I haven't got a clue and I don't know exactly where to start

I can't see an earthing issue causing the battery to discharge slowly.... It might cause it to fail to start initially but to just discharge slowly seems odd

[KarlBristol]

Right I've just measured the battery voltage again
This is exactly an hour after I last measured it
Car alarm and immobiliser has been on but the car hasn't been plugged into the trickle charger

An hour ago it was 12.21V now it's 12.05V
So that's a loss of 0.16V in an hour

That may be because I'm using the old battery and it's shot or it may be a drain on my system somewhere

Car is now locked but not alarmed and plugged into the trickle charger
I will try to check it in an hours time again


Anyone know what to check or test?
I'm going to buy some cheap earthing cables tonight for the engine block just to see if that has any effect....

[KarlBristol]

Oh, I didn't click that.

If your battery is losing charge overnight it has to be a parasitic drain, no? It's unusual (and I hope wrong, since I've just bought one) but could your CTEK potentially be to blame...?

I was thinking that it's draining somewhere
Not sure how to test where it's draining though...

Last night I had it plugged in and it discharged quickly
Since I installed the battery and shut the car exactly an hour ago I've had the alarm on but the Ctek not attached and it's lost 0.16V
I'm presuming that proves that the Ctek isn't to blame...


Unless of course my old battery was shot and my new one is mysteriously duff. But that seems a little coincidental.

[tottacrolla]

Probably draining power through the alternator.

[KarlBristol]

Probably draining power through the alternator.

How would one test for that?

If hypothetically it is draining power through the alternator...
Is that an issue with the alternator itself or the earthing of it?
If the entire engine block is better earthed would it solve that issue?

[Peter Gidden]

The alternator is earthed through the engine. You don't have an earthing fault, and you have no symptoms of an earthing fault. You do not need to add any earths - totally pointless and unnecessary.

You might, as suggested, have an alternator fault.

If you do, you can confirm by measuring parasitic current flow through the positive battery lead with an ammeter.

[KarlBristol]

Evidently my ammeter is shot as it's still showing 0 when testing for parasitic draw...

If I had an alternator fault why would it still charge the battery?
Why wouldn't I have the little dash lights of alternator doom?

I presume if the ammeter test came up as showing a parasitic draw I would need a new alternator?

If my alternator is fubarred at least I have a new battery as a result of thinking that was the issue

[KarlBristol]

Just tested the battery an hour after the last time
Alarm off and battery trickle charger connected for the last hour

Exactly 12.00V so that's a loss of 0.05V even when connected to a trickle charger

The issue therefore isn't the alarm as it's still losing a reasonable amount of Volts per hour even when connected to a charger