Hello all.

New to site here with my recent addition to the family; an 86 B250 Ram Van that I bought a few weeks back for $100 from a good friend who needed the money . After some initial maintenence, I am quite pleased but seem to have a problem that I just can't get my head around. It seems that something keeps draining my battery if I do not drive it for a couple days and for the life of me, I can't figure out what is going on. Nothing is on what so ever and still the battery is dead in a couple of days of which after a good charge from the battery charger in the house, it still charges well. It has a new alternator installed, so I know that is not the problem, but something is amiss. Anyone else ever have this problem. I have even tried swapping batteries from another vehicle and have the same end result. Anybody have an answer or any input? Also would anyone know where to find the diagnostic port to check trouble codes? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

Draining a battery down to the point it cannot start a vehicle is batterycide. To prevent this in between drives disconnect the ground cable.

Even if you could get trouble codes from you '86, which I am not sure you can, they would say nothing about a drain.

To help you find what circuit is draining, you need to hook an digital ammeter set to DC amps inbetween the ground cable and battery. It will read a number.
Start pulling fuses one by one until this number goes down to near zero. Once you identify the circuit, you then need to find which device within that circuit is the problem, which is not as easy, especially if you do not have a list of what fuses are for what.

But I will guess that somewhere along your alternator charging circuit, a wire has chafed and is touching ground. Follow the fat wire from alternator to battery (+) to eliminate this possibility.

Let us know what you find

 

Too bad he can't say the same. The value of the van is up around $800, maybe a bit more. Yet you took advantage of your "good friend" when he was in a tough spot by paying only $100 for it. Then you come here and announce it. I guess we all have different definitions of what a "good friend" is.

 

@ landyacht. Do you mean take the negative battery cable off and measure voltage from it to the empty battery terminal?


@ alloro. One should really keep one's opinions to his/herself when it involves judging people they don't even know and the circumstances by which their good fortune tends to fall under. In addition to that, one should really only post answers to questions and matters at hand that are posted on this site, and stay on point to finding a solution to such, instead of posting gossipy propaganda that only makes them look like a troublesome busybody. -End Quote

 

A regular voltage reading will tell you nothing in your case. What you propose wouldn't even read battery voltage. You could do some resistance tests like what you propose, but they would likely not be relevant to your drain issue.

I meant for you to take a digital volt meter. Set it to DC amps and re arrange the negative lead to the proper port on the DVM for testing DC amps. When you hook the leads between the negative battery post and the negative battery cable, it will display how many amps or milliamps are flowing through your system with everything off.
Most DVM's are capable only of 10 amps maximum, but a 10 amp draw would deplete your battery in about 7 hours. Do not try and run anything with the DVM wired inline with the negative cable!

Any remote door locks, the stereo memory and the ECM/PCM (engine computer) will use a small amount of current, but not enough to drain a battery in a few days, more like 7 weeks.

When you get a base number, start pulling fuses, one by one, until you find the circuit with the draw. If none of the fuse pullings change that number, it is most likely the charging circuit which does not run through any glass or ATC fuses.

 

You opened up the invitation to opinions when you posted the details of your "good fortune" on a public forum. You could've just posted the problem you're having but you didn't, you had to throw in how you obtained the vehicle, and in doing so made it part of the discussion. Whether or not you liked my response is irrelevant, you invited it whether intentionally or inadvertently.

As far as posting solutions go, I'll compare track records anytime. If there's not enough information here on this site, I have others you can go check out. Of course you could've taken what I said and dwelled on it for a bit of self-reflection, but instead you chose to try and make me the bad guy for your actions. I guess ONE could just add that on top of the take advantage of a "good friend" scenario and see what type of person comes out of it in the end.