ANOTHER parasitic battery drain problem

[Lewis Long]

Thanks for the suggestions. After reading Phat Hippy's post, I pulled the plug from the ignition switch, with no change to the current draw. On the good side, I do now have an extra ignition switch for when this one fails, and have learned that I can seek a new career as a contortionist, after wedging my 6'4" body into the footwell, upside down.

Thstone, I installed the stereo myself. I have a lot of stereo installation experience dating back forty years (!), and I don't trust aftermarket installers working on someone else's car to make sure that there are no shorts, rattles or squeaks after the installation. I made sure that all of the lose wires were in split loom, capped and tied up. It is wired into the existing wiring harness with an aftermarket adapter plug from Crutchfield, and fused from the car's fuse block, and no power drawn directly from the battery, so pulling fuses should have isolated that problem. The amps do draw directly from the battery, but I pulled the amp power lines to test the draw.

That having been said, though, your suggestion is a good one, and I will pull the head unit again to make sure that I haven't pinched or abraded a wire when I pulled the stereo a few months ago for a different problem.

It's drawing between 3.4 and 3.7 amps even with all of the interior and trunk lights off, which is a lot of draw, and if it were a short, enough to generate some serious heat. I'm beginning to think that there may be a short near the alternator, somewhere that can drain that kind of power without starting a fire.