Ok so i have a 71 Grabber and its been running fine till a few days ago. My battery would keep draining and dieing. Naturally I thought it was either the battery had a dead cell or the alternator was bad so I checked both alternator was dying so to speak and battery was getting old so replaced them both. However the problem would still persist. Since then Ive replaced the solenoid, voltage regulator terminal cables and replaced the starter for good measures. Still having this problem so I ask if there was a component I missed or should i move on and start looking for shorts in the electrical. Any help would be appreciated.
Take off your negative battery cable and connect a test light between the disconnected cable and the negative battery post. If the light is on, you have a drain. Make sure everything is off, especially stuff like a glove box light, or trunk light (if you have one ). If nothing is on, pull each fuse one by one ( replacing them as you go ) until the test light goes out. That will be the circuit that has a draw. Remember to push in your door switches for the courtesy light when testing. Your problem shouldn't be too hard to find!
Disconnect the negative battery cable...put a test light between the negative post of the battery and battery ground cable. If the light stays on then you have something draining the battery. If so, remove one fuse at a time to figure out what is pulling power.
Did you check all of the wires in the alternator harness, and the fuse-able links for corrosion? The wrap on the wires is just electrical tape, cut it out or pull it back and get a good look at the splices. I've seen plenty that looked good from the outside but if you pull back the tape it just starts dropping green dust everywhere.
does your "ALT" light on the instrument cluster illuminate when you turn the key on and does it go off when you start the car...If it does not come on at all...The bulb may be burned out. If its burned out...Your charging sys will not function. The bulb is the reiestance the reg needs to turn the alt on.
So after pulling fuses Ive discovered that the drain is comming from the ground itself to the engineas the grounding wire looks as though something was eating it. Note to self keep car in garage more lol thanks for the help.
I think you will find that after repairing the ground, your drain will still exist. That bad ground wire could definitely give you a poor charging condition, though!
This will be the time to start disconnecting things that have a circuit breaker for protection such as the headlight switch and wiper switch.
