Hi I have 2014 fiat 500 1.2 lounge. The car has been sitting on the driveway for a week and battery ran flat. Thinking as it is an original battery and it might be coming to end of life. So I decided to spend £125 on the new battery from Halford. The car has been work good but then not used the car for a week again and found battery is flat!
Thinking might be alternator I called Greenflag (recovering) the man checked the battery and the alternator and both are in good order. I have checked all the bulbs that might be on but nothing is on everything switched off! Can someone please help ?? Is there fault with circuit or is there a fault? Also now I have changed the battery I have lost Bluetooth function in the car how do I get it back ? Thanks

You need to try and find which circuit is drawing the current by pulling fuses, note that it's not unheard of that the Bluetooth is the cause of the drain?

Your blue&me (Bluetooth)
Control unit will likely have failed which is also the most common cause of a battery drain as well.
It’s located in the passenger rear quarter panel

I leave the car for two days and it is flat. My daughter was using the car audio for a couple of hours when I was on a visit and I couldn't start the car to get us back home, the drainage was that quick. I have fitted a new battery, had the altenator checked and any drop in voltage across the fuses (so I was told by my non-regular mechanic).

I bought a booster pack from Halfords which didn't do anything, so I have to keep borrowing one from the local garage every time I forget to start the car on a daily basis. Any idea what could be causing this?

Yiggoto said:

I leave the car for two days and it is flat. My daughter was using the car audio for a couple of hours when I was on a visit and I couldn't start the car to get us back home, the drainage was that quick. I have fitted a new battery, had the altenator checked and any drop in voltage across the fuses (so I was told by my non-regular mechanic).

I bought a booster pack from Halfords which didn't do anything, so I have to keep borrowing one from the local garage every time I forget to start the car on a daily basis. Any idea what could be causing this?

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Does the car have Bluetooth?

burrowsdeano said:

Your blue&me (Bluetooth)
Control unit will likely have failed which is also the most common cause of a battery drain as well.
It’s located in the passenger rear quarter panel

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Don’t I know about that [emoji51][emoji51][emoji51][emoji51]

Hi Yiggoto,

Firstly that is damned expensive for a new battery even for a start/stop. I just bought one for my S/S 2010 500s because I stupidly ruined the original jumping and wrongly charging the battery to start the car after sat around unused while we had been sorting out the new sat nav replacement upgrade we flattened the original. (not much experience in batteries or the S/S battery as did not even know there was a difference). Good make £62 with 3 year guarantee. Worst thing was it also screwed up my electronic devices talking/lining up to each other so got warning lights staying on.


I am surprised your breakdown guy had not done a simple 'parasitic' drain test and located the exact circuit causing the fault. As what john202020 mentions. This is a simple test but you do need the correct type electronic VA meter. Usually once the circuit is located providing it is not an essential circuit you can leave the fuse out and use car until problem fixed.........(information supplied by Hacky) Alternatively a pain but just take the fuse out while the car is left standing.

We had a 1980's Jaguar once and it was engine management system causing problem draining battery overnight but we changed every component/sensor and not even main dealer could fix. It was assumed somewhere there was a fault in the harness wiring and was an open cheque on how much it would cost to find. In the end to save removing the fuse every night we had a £3 relay fitted in the circuit to cut off when ignition switched off and it worked fine then for 20 years.


What concerns me is if you paid £125 for your new battery I wonder if it is a Start/Stop special and therefore doing it no good if you are continually having to jump the car.

That said I did read at the time typecastboys issues with the BlueMe and does seem a likely cause.

Farrah

Engine earth strap, has that been replaced?

John202020 said:

Does the car have Bluetooth?

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Yes, it has bluetooth. Can that drain a battery when the unit is switched off?

Yiggoto said:

Yes, it has bluetooth. Can that drain a battery when the unit is switched off?

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Yes, it’s quite common. It would need to be unplugged from the unit itself to stop the drain.

typecastboy said:

Yes, it’s quite common. It would need to be unplugged from the unit itself to stop the drain.

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From the back of the audio unit?

Yiggoto said:

From the back of the audio unit?

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No, needs to be unplugged from the rear of the Blue & Me unit.

It could be something as simple as the boot light staying on, or a drain through the interior light?

Turn the interior light off, see what happens. If you take the parcel shelf out, you might be able to see if the light is on at night.

I hope, for your sake that it is something this simple

I sold the car today and disclosed the problem to the buyer. It is a 12 plate with 73k on the clock and history to 60k. I got £2100 for it. I saw a dealer selling a 57 plate for 3k. Oh well.

Shame, probably done the right thing.

Dealer prices have the addition of a warranty, they have to make a profit and it could sit there for a while, they also allow for a haggle price and if there is any work to be done, make it presentable.

There's other overheads such as rent, paying other staff etc

So there's not always a huge margin involved for them.

My car wouldn't start after not being used for a week. Just done all the tests for battery drain. I was getting a reading of 900ma when everything was off! What can possibly be using that much current? I done all the fuse tests and nothing reduces down to 50ma which I understand is what it should be.

Incaman said:

My car wouldn't start after not being used for a week. Just done all the tests for battery drain. I was getting a reading of 900ma when everything was off! What can possibly be using that much current? I done all the fuse tests and nothing reduces down to 50ma which I understand is what it should be.

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Blue and me often has a parasitic drain.

It's a POP it doesn't have Bluetooth. The only fuse that drops the level at all is the one for the radio, but it's the OEM radio so how does that cause any drain if it's off? I've decided to try a new battery as I don't know how the original one has been treated or if Stop/Start has been used all the time or not by the previous owner. Personally I always have it switched off!

Firstly: you need to wait a few minutes until everything in the car has gone into sleep mode before measuring parasitic current.
Secondly: a new battery won't fix that problem, but it does not hurt either.

Car radios have a permanent power connection to maintain settings when switched off. That should not draw 100s of mA, though. If it does, the radio has a fault. If pulling the radio fuse solves the problem, you could rewire the radio to complete power off, but that means factory settings and no stations stored after each start.