Power Leak?

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no1newb

no1newb

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Speedway, IN
So I don't know what happened. but i drove my car for about a week. let it sit, and a week later the battery was dead. jumped it and let it run and took it around the block. had to park it on the street for 2 days, went to start it today and it was dead again. don't know what happened, but sometimes the ignition switch wont do anything until i move some of the wires around behind the dash. is there a chance there could be a short right there or something. I don't know where to start or anything.
 
I think you answered your own question. where the switch/wiring is faulty, you dont know if it is turning everything off or not.
Remove the negative battery cable. Get a test light and put it between the negative battery post and the negative cable. If there is a draw ( leak ) the light will come on.
 
just dont know where the problem would be at, or if theres a new harness i can get for the ignition switch?
 
Start with battery, Charged?. then pull the cluster, and find which wire is not getting a good connection. Search madelectric.com.
 
I'd start by pulling the negative battery cable like redfish advised (make sure everything is off), then use an ammeter and see if you're drawing any current. You should be drawing zero current unless you have an aftermarket radio in which case you might be drawing micro-amps of current to keep the radio memory alive.

If you find you are drawing current try to isolate where it's going by pulling fuses one at a time while monitoring the meter.

One common battery drainer is the glove box light or other light being on when you think it's not (I had this happen to me until I looked one night and saw a glow... duh).

Good luck!
 
well i found my power problem, somewhere I read to put the two wires on the ammeter on the same post so there would be less current loss or something through my interior, well turns out those to connections were sparking and the wires are actually melted together now, i took the nut holding them down off and it burnt the hell out of my finger(i disconnected the battery first). so i just got to fix that up and hopefully that will be the end of my problem for the moment.
 
no1newb said:
well i found my power problem, somewhere I read to put the two wires on the ammeter on the same post so there would be less current loss or something through my interior, well turns out those to connections were sparking and the wires are actually melted together now, i took the nut holding them down off and it burnt the hell out of my finger(i disconnected the battery first). so i just got to fix that up and hopefully that will be the end of my problem for the moment.
Click to expand...

That is not the problem. You can put those together with no problem. It Justs by passes the gauge. If they are hot you might have a short in the charging system.
 
I have to agree that what you found is not your original problem. What you found is another problem typical of Mopar ammeter issues. Be sure to use starwashers and tighten the nuts on the meter.

You still need to find where your current draw is coming from by using an external ammeter to measure the current off the battery.
 
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