Odd electrical problem

It started months ago, maybe one every few weeks the battery would act like it had a dirty post but would spin right over when I shorted on the solenoid (69 Ford pickup) This never happened at home (heat soak?) so I always just fired it up under the hood and drove away. It started happening a bit more often and I had cleaned all my connections. So a few days ago I ran out of gas, poured in the can I was carrying and it did it again only it would crank real slow from the key or shorting on the relay. I put a volt meter on the battery and it had 12.76 but as soon as I would crank it went down to under 8 and the battery gas smell would be very noticeable. I got a jump and drove the mile home, shut it off and it cranked right up fine, alternator is charging good at 13.8. I changed the battery and so far haven't had any troubles (5 days) and yesterday I used the old battery to jump the skidsteer and it still had 12.7
I had not done a starter draw or any voltage drop test test so i don't know if that is a problem but I think the starter would poop out pretty soon if it was problematic.
Any guesses? We'll see who nailes it after I get around to pinning the problem down.

Nut loose between the steering wheel and the seat? :HMMM:


Sounds like a bad battery....

Could be high resistance in the wire or connections between the key switch and the solenoid. Or even the ignition switch.

I would keep using hte new battery. If all is fine then you know its a bad original battery you had in. Maybe it shows a full charge but under load it is bad?

My battery went dead last week (enough the car would not turn over) for no reason I could find. Had everythying tested on the car and under load and all was just fine. So far, still all OK..............

The odd thing was, when I jumped it under the hood, I could drive 2 blocks and shut it off and it would start fine the next time. I am thinking battery too because it had gotten more frequent and the battery gas smell was prevelant whenever I had to open the hood to jump across the sol. It never showed any signs of high resistance at any of the connections (like hot) It has never done it at the shop where I have the resources to investigate, although I do carry my dvom everywhere.

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Originally Posted by moter

Nut loose between the steering wheel and the seat? :HMMM:


Sounds like a bad battery....

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moter, maybe you missed this

http://www.clubhotrod.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12559

Batteries can do weird things sometimes. They can have internal shorts that slowly or quickly drain them. A voltmeter is also not a good test on a battery, you need to do it with a load tester, and even those are not 100 percent sometimes.

We chased an electrical problem on my ex-GF car and finally found that the 2 year old battery was not making the grade any more. In Florida, with our high heat all the time , batteries don't last very long. When I was in the marine business I recommended people should change them out at the 2 year mark because they will let you down when you least expect it, and tows on the water are very expensive...........like $ 1000 expensive. :eek: So changing the battery was good insurance.

Don

I would be suspicious of the battery cables, first, given what you have said. Sometimes they can corrode down inside of the cable, and it doesen't show on the terminal ends. Also, if your ground at the block is dirty, it will sometimes act up the way you describe; loose connections, too - they may not look loose, but on heating and cooling under current draw, they may get just enough increase in resistance to cause more high current draw, thus bringing on the same symptoms as a low or dying battery. In the end, it may well be the battery, but if you want to save some money at the expense of some time, cables are cheaper than a battery, and it costs nothing to go through all of the related connections and clean and tighten them. That's my nickels worth.

I did replace all the cables about a year ago to get rid of the clamp on ends from the previous owner. So far it hasn't acted up so I am thinking the battery had an intermittent short. That will be a first in my 40 some years of wrenching to have a battery come and go, they usually just go.

If the battery is emiting fumes it has a weak cell...I'll bet if you put a load on it with the caps off one of the cells will be bubbling.. They can still sort of work when they are like that..

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Originally Posted by willowbilly3

I did replace all the cables about a year ago to get rid of the clamp on ends from the previous owner. So far it hasn't acted up so I am thinking the battery had an intermittent short. That will be a first in my 40 some years of wrenching to have a battery come and go, they usually just go.

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Over the years I've had a couple of batteries develop weak cells and one of them was barely 6 months old. They would take a charge but they wouldn't hold it and a load test confirmed it.

I have a 9100 Powermaster mini starter. The solenoid posts are side by side not up and down like OEM. The battery terminal is on the engine side. Considering all the routings I could take, it seems like I come too close to the other terminal or come close to the exhaust. I am thinking about putting a tight 90 degree bend on the battery cable terminal end, come over top of the solenoid. There is no divider between the two posts to I will be close. Then route back to the battery mounted on the frame under the pass seat. I will be close to trans cooling lines. The other option is to come from the frame, go UNDER the starter motor and circle around from the engine side. This way seems odd. What am I doing wrong?