Weekly Battery Drain! Help (Think Its The Alarm!)

[Elegnem555]

Hello all,

 

2 weeks ago I bought a 09 Sebring, The car is the proverbial dogs doodahs!! It is a beautiful comfortable stylish and modern car, feature packed, stunning inside out and is a solid, beautiful drive! Just 1 issue! The bloody battery keeps draining empty!!

 

Day after I bought the car, (had been driving most of the day before) tries to unlock, nothing opening, opened manually, tried to start, totally dead, not a flicker of aything. AA called, confirmed the alternator was brand new, checked the battery, which the previous owner had only just replaced and paid £180 for the right version, Spiral cell or something like that. all receipts, guarantees etc..  Battery was completely drained, he fired it up no problem and I spoke with the previous owner and he advised me to disconnect the big green fuse which I believe controls all the memory and saves battery power, which I dis and for the rest of the week, no problem at all.

 

Last Wednesday, (absolutely throwing it down outside!!) reconnect the fuse as usual, try to unlock, wont unlock, sinking feeling emerging and yes, the battery was completely dead!! AA out again!

 

No problems up until this evening! Car used all day, unlocked normally, went to start, all electrics fired up, engine would not turn over, hooked it up to the old car, wouldnt start!! (thinking it could be something more serious now!!) played with the key as I suspected some sort of alarm/immobiliser issue (will expand upon in a minute) after fiddling with the key, the red alarm light came on the dash, car locked, then I unlocked, tried to start and fired up straight away!!

 

Now, the alarm has been very tempremental over the past few days especially! sometimes it beeps when locking, others it doesnt. 

Yesterday the central locking would not work in any shape or form nor could I open the boot with the fob, I locked it manually and around an hour later the alarm went off,  used the fob to open and it worked, all back to normal after the alarm went off!!

 

The alarm has been driving me nuts over the past few days, just going off for no reason at all, lock the car and 1 minute later alarm goes off. turn it off and another minute later off it goes again!

 

I really suspect this could be the drainage culprit as I had something very similar with an Audi I had, however that was not a factory alarm and that got disconnected. I believe this is the factory alarm.

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated before I take it to an auto sparky and let them rip the wiring to bits and come up with nothing.

 

Also on a seperate issue, I believe there is a Chrysler corrosion warranty? car has some bubbling at the front and would like to get this sorted as it is spoiling the appearance, I've been told the same thing by the previous owner and the AA mechanic who also ironically owned a Dodge. Apparantly as I was told, Chrysler will repair the damage as long as there has been no respray or paint job?? Im not an expert but I know a paint job when I see one and this car has definitely not had any spray job whatsoever. 

Trouble is, I cant find an existing Chrysler dealership anywhere in the North West!!

 

Any advice would be greatly welcomed.

 

many thanks in advance for any hints/advice.

[jonnoj]

Regards your battery, I had a similar issue, before you pay a penny, take apart the contacts on the right of the engine bay, where the jump start points are, one by one sand them clean so they are making good contact again, a mechanic recommended adding extra ground cables from certain points, but just a clean has worked for me.

 

Regarding paint, I wish could help but I have resprayed parts of mine, I also have bubbling on the front edge of the bonnet, probably a common issue. As for finding a dealer, Chrysler don't sell to the UK anymore and would probably avoid being any help. You could try a jeep dealer?

 

Good luck and I hope the battery problem is a easy fix

[jonnoj]

Also the battery being weak/fluctuating voltage because of bad contact can have crazy effects, mine had the windows stop working and radio wouldn't turn off till I pulled the fuse, the wipers wouldn't work, lights would flicker like crazy and still occasionally do. All of this got better after I cleaned the battery contacts

[mikebh8]

Hi, if Jonnoj's advice doesn't help try to see the wires going through the door to inside the car. Alarm beeping when armed it means a door/s are open, of you have a wire or a set of wires that became faulty and they touch intermittently you will get those errors and the battery will drain.

Plus the previous owner knows more than he tells, new alternator, new battery and knowing about the fuse... to me indicates the fault was inspected before, when you went see it, did you find it with the engine running?

 

Hope it helps.

Edited August 3, 2017 by mikebh8

[Elegnem555]

All some good answers thank you, there was an issue with the drivers door, it is disconnected from the central locking. I started locking it manually since I posted this and touch wood it has been fine..

 

Up until now! Alarm started going off for no reason, the typical car alarm whine, then which really perplexed me, another alarm sound went off, the horn beeping, even louder.

 

Could it be possible 2 alarms are overlapping, a factory and a fitted one? 

[mikebh8]

Same alarm has more options, some noises are to make the owner/driver awear of something not right, others are to make awear others that something's wrong and who ever is in or near the car needs help.

I think because of the door wiring more signals are sent to the alarm module and reacts the way it does.

 

Hope it helps.

[Elegnem555]

Is there any way of completely deactivating the alarm, as of now I cannot drive the car as the alarm will not stop, even whilst driving the alarm keeps going off. I've had to pull the fuse out and stay off work today. 

[mikebh8]

It runs through the ecu as well, it is a bit tricky to deactivate it without being fully working, even so it won't be easy. Disconnect the buzzer/s ( the horn/s) and if the ecu let's you drive it, that's a temporary fix.

[Elegnem555]

I managed to get an Auto electrician out and he took out the siren that was under the wheel arch. He was the only one who knew anything about Chryslers!!

It is definitely looking a central locking issue that is triggering the alarm all the time. He said the alarm thinks the door is open all the time that's why it keeps going off. It made sense as my door is unplugged.

He suggested getting a replacement central locking motor and seeing how that goes.

For now all seems quiet but will have to see.

[mikebh8]

To bad you're far from me, I would've sort it out in an hour...

Hope you get it sort it at the end.

 

P.S before investing in parts, make sure that's at fault, to me it sounds like a short, positive to ground or vice versa, I'm not sure on your model but for testing purposes you could swap the mechanisms between them, the front door ones, it should have the same plugs. If the one on the driveraide works on the other door is not that.

Edited August 11, 2017 by mikebh8