F430 battery draining!
Discussion
The battery on my F430 dies if I leave the car for a week without starting it!
When I do drive it (every fri and sat, approx 200 miles per week) it obviously charges and starts easily.
I can't plug in a charger etc as the car is in an underground car park so I'm a bit stuck.
Surely a week is not normal?
Batter and alternator have been tested and all ok, and I have checked all electrics and the only abnormality i can find is the stereo can be turned on when the car is off (no key in ignition) but obviously the radio is never left on.
Any one seen this problem before?
When I do drive it (every fri and sat, approx 200 miles per week) it obviously charges and starts easily.
I can't plug in a charger etc as the car is in an underground car park so I'm a bit stuck.
Surely a week is not normal?
Batter and alternator have been tested and all ok, and I have checked all electrics and the only abnormality i can find is the stereo can be turned on when the car is off (no key in ignition) but obviously the radio is never left on.
Any one seen this problem before?
mrbon007 said:
The battery on my F430 dies if I leave the car for a week without starting it!
When I do drive it (every fri and sat, approx 200 miles per week) it obviously charges and starts easily.
I can't plug in a charger etc as the car is in an underground car park so I'm a bit stuck.
Surely a week is not normal?
Batter and alternator have been tested and all ok, and I have checked all electrics and the only abnormality i can find is the stereo can be turned on when the car is off (no key in ignition) but obviously the radio is never left on.
Any one seen this problem before?
When I first got my F430 I had exactly the same problem. If I left it more than 3 days (no not joking) then that battery would die. Which then meant the car wouldn't unlock and so on. I called the dealer a million times and they said to me that the car needed to run for 40 MINUTES to recharge the battery for all the power it used to start the car. Eventually I suggested buying a new battery and the problem was solved. It will now last well over a week (haven't left it any longer) and it will still start first time. When I do drive it (every fri and sat, approx 200 miles per week) it obviously charges and starts easily.
I can't plug in a charger etc as the car is in an underground car park so I'm a bit stuck.
Surely a week is not normal?
Batter and alternator have been tested and all ok, and I have checked all electrics and the only abnormality i can find is the stereo can be turned on when the car is off (no key in ignition) but obviously the radio is never left on.
Any one seen this problem before?
As has already been said though I really would look at getting a battery conditioner. You can get them wired in so all you have to do is literally just plug it in. You could have the wire closed in the door, which is what I'm doing at the moment as it's not in my garage but at the office, so you can lock the car.
Hope that helps
Battery conditioners are great, but when you have a power drain, they are simply masking the odour, I mean issue...
Performing a current draw test, locating the offending item is like fabreeze, it elimanites the issue.
This is not hard to do, particurally on a F430. Simply remove the battery cover plate (passenger footwel) remove the negative battery terminal, set your multimeter onto the amps scale, connect the multimeter inline (so the negative lead is connected to the battery, but via the multimeter) you should then close the door, put the mutlimeter on the dash, and wait for the readings to drop. They should drop to 0.04amps or lower, perhaps a bit more is tolerable, but certanly anything more than 900milliamps is too much.
If you do have a draw (which I suspect you have) then you would need to remove fuses one by one and retest. This can be time consuming but once you find the causel you should be OK. The most common thing is the navtrack, but to be honest, posting that on a public forum how to disable it would be irresponsible.
Good luck
Performing a current draw test, locating the offending item is like fabreeze, it elimanites the issue.
This is not hard to do, particurally on a F430. Simply remove the battery cover plate (passenger footwel) remove the negative battery terminal, set your multimeter onto the amps scale, connect the multimeter inline (so the negative lead is connected to the battery, but via the multimeter) you should then close the door, put the mutlimeter on the dash, and wait for the readings to drop. They should drop to 0.04amps or lower, perhaps a bit more is tolerable, but certanly anything more than 900milliamps is too much.
If you do have a draw (which I suspect you have) then you would need to remove fuses one by one and retest. This can be time consuming but once you find the causel you should be OK. The most common thing is the navtrack, but to be honest, posting that on a public forum how to disable it would be irresponsible.
Good luck
lambo_xx said:
When I first got my F430 I had exactly the same problem. If I left it more than 3 days (no not joking) then that battery would die. Which then meant the car wouldn't unlock and so on. I called the dealer a million times and they said to me that the car needed to run for 40 MINUTES to recharge the battery for all the power it used to start the car. Eventually I suggested buying a new battery and the problem was solved. It will now last well over a week (haven't left it any longer) and it will still start first time.
As has already been said though I really would look at getting a battery conditioner. You can get them wired in so all you have to do is literally just plug it in. You could have the wire closed in the door, which is what I'm doing at the moment as it's not in my garage but at the office, so you can lock the car.
Hope that helps
Unfortunatly, dealers will concoct a load of bull like the car takes 40mins to recharge the battery, crazy. Like lambo_xx experienced, a dying battery can be hell to live with, and no matter how long you drive the car for, will never recharge and be 100%. To know if your battery is dead, or on its way out, remove the battery from the car, charge for 12 hours and let the battery sit for a futher 3 hours. Apply a large load to the battery and ensure it does not drop below 9.5v during a load lasting 12secs. If it does, replace.As has already been said though I really would look at getting a battery conditioner. You can get them wired in so all you have to do is literally just plug it in. You could have the wire closed in the door, which is what I'm doing at the moment as it's not in my garage but at the office, so you can lock the car.
Hope that helps
battery on the 430 is not that big and its a basic one. the gel based ones seem better but i was unable to swap mine as there wasnt room in the battery cage for the one i got.
problem on mine was due to the tracker unit. cant remember exact details but the earlier units fitted didnt go to sleep in the same way as later ones or were prone to develop a fault and in an underground car park kept signalling hence using decent battery load. changed the unit and battery and kept on trickle charger was my outcome, didnt have a problem after
select auto systems were the guys i used,they do a lot of work for main dealers they said and he definitely knew how to diassemble and rebuild a 430 to get to it. think was about 600 quid for the tracker unit change but my warranty paid out
problem on mine was due to the tracker unit. cant remember exact details but the earlier units fitted didnt go to sleep in the same way as later ones or were prone to develop a fault and in an underground car park kept signalling hence using decent battery load. changed the unit and battery and kept on trickle charger was my outcome, didnt have a problem after
select auto systems were the guys i used,they do a lot of work for main dealers they said and he definitely knew how to diassemble and rebuild a 430 to get to it. think was about 600 quid for the tracker unit change but my warranty paid out
I had a similar problem with mine, was ready to buy a new battery until one night locking the car in a dark garage I noticed the radio display whilst been switched off, was still glowing faintly. Seemed the issue was the SD card slot in the unit staying switched on somehow...? Radio fixed, solution found, worth checking just in case before you buy a new battery I suppose.
kryten22uk said:
I had the same problem. Despite the battery coming up ok in checks, I still changed it and from then on it lasted weeks without use and still started fine. I don't subscribe to the charger brigade; its just flogging a dead horse.
Agreed. I regularly leave mine for two/three weeks without starting, and I've never had a problem with it.Gassing Station | Supercar General | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff