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1963 marauder battery dieing very fast

2K views 12 replies 4 participants last post by  jimbucci 
#1 ·
Any suggestions would be great. Battery can be fully charged and if left hooked up its flat dead in 20 minutes. All interior lights are off headlights etc. Something major has to be drawing on this thing and I need suggestions. Have been told starter, alternator, but what could sucj that much juice that fast? The starter does stop cranking and makes a whirring noise if its cranking and starts to catch then didn't then u have to return the key to off wait for it to stop whirring then crank it again but I can't see that draining it. Also its not the battery it has been replaced and the old one did it too. If I check with a multimrter from disconnected hot wire to the positeve post with one leed on each I should read what if its not drawing anything? 12 v right? Anything over 12 is drawing from the battery right?
 
#2 ·
STEP BY STEP.


1: Charge Battery

2: Remove ONE Battery Cable

3: Place Test light between Battery Cable and Battery terminal.

4: If the Test light lights up then you have a DRAW. If it does NOT light up then you have a crappy battery, get a new one.

5: Assuming the test light LIT up see #6 and so on.

6: Leave Test light Connected to Batt Terminal and Batt Cable and Begin PULLING and REPLACING Fuses one at a time.

7: At some point that Test light is going to go OUT. THAT is the circuit that is draining your battery (see #8)

8: Assuming the light stayed on through all that please see #9 and ignore #7 becasue it didn't happen.

9: Now proceed under the hood to Disconnect the Alternator and The putting it back as you found it.

10: Now do it to the Regulator.

11. Find the idiot that told you the issue could be the starter and smack him.

12: If you do ALL of these things and the light never goes out, you need to sell the car to a hermit.


THAT is how you find a draw on your battery. Please type your results in the reply box below and hit reply.


FE
 
#8 ·
OK alternator disconnected is OK.voltage regulator behind driver side headlight when disconnected test light goes out. however if you look at the picture you will see a bunch of spiced yellow wires that is obviously not done by Ford does anyone know what the yellow wires are for and if I should just replace the voltage regulator now or could this wiring be my problem
 

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#10 ·
That's what I was thinking of doing. Can't hurt to change the regulator anyways. I guess I can just try n clean up the lousy splices spread the wires apart so nothing is touching and check again. There's 2 yellow wires in the bundle that have been soldered together and have bare wire exposed but I have no clue what they are for.
 
#13 ·
Hey man thanks to you I'm freaking ecstatic. Eliminated a boat load of worries for me. I did not wanna get into a major electrical cluster f@%&. Now I just gotta figure out why there's no headlights. Hopefully its just the plug on the firewall in need of a cleaning
 
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