Battery drained in a few days?

[heypete]

Hi folks,

My 2006 B&W 150 is draining its battery to totally dead[0] when left without being driven over the weekend.

This happens both with the original, three year old battery, and three month old freshly-charged battery that I put in the scooter prior to the last weekend.

My first thought was that the storage compartment's dome light was somehow not turning off, and so was draining the battery, but I tested it this afternoon and the lamp turns off with the seat closed securely. To be on the safe side, I removed the bulb. The battery draining behavior only started after I put the light bulb in -- when I bought it, there was only the lamp housing but no bulb.

I've taken to keeping one battery on the Battery Tender Jr. at all times, then swapping it out with the one in the scooter after each weekend. Needless to say, it's a bit frustrating, and I fear it may be taking a toll on the battery lifespan.

Any ideas as to what could be causing this rather serious battery drain in such a short time? The scooter resides in Tucson, AZ, but even the heat shouldn't be enough to discharge a battery so deeply in only a few days. I have a multimeter, but it's at home and I won't be able to access it for about a week.

• To the point where my Battery Tender Jr. wouldn't start charging it until I got a bit of a "base charge" from a dumb charger. After that, the Battery Tender Jr. worked fine.

[axy]

If you are sure that the battery drain is connected with the met in box light bulb, then you have pinpointed the culprit.

[art]

 I would check your ignition switch(clean and inspect) Than trace your hot lead out from the battery.     The  ignition is not doing it's job or you have a dead short somewhere. If it's not the simple light switch.

[heypete]

If you are sure that the battery drain is connected with the met in box light bulb, then you have pinpointed the culprit.

I'm not certain that the light bulb is the cause, as it does seem to turn off when the box is closed. (As an aside, what the heck does "met in" mean? Sure, it refers to the storage box, but what do the words themselves mean? I've never heard of any sort of storage box referred to as "met in".)

The problem manifested itself after the bulb was installed, but that could just be coincidence.

I would check your ignition switch(clean and inspect) Than trace your hot lead out from the battery.     The  ignition is not doing it's job or you have a dead short somewhere. If it's not the simple light switch.

Wouldn't a short drain the battery extremely quickly, not to mention presenting a fire risk?

I'll check out the ignition switch. Is there something in particular I'll be looking for?

I'll continue to update the thread as I got more information (my work has a multimeter, so I can get actual data) so others who suffer from similar problems might benefit. If anyone has more information or suggestions in the interim, I'd be much obliged if they'd comment as well.

[art]

 Sometimes just an electrical contact cleaner and working  the key will be enouph. As far as the short go's it depends on the guage of the wire and how much contact it's makeing,but a concearn non the less because if the key is off there should be no drain. This light you speak of is a good possibility for this. It may be wired direct bypassing the key and have a bad contact drawing power at all times.

[heypete]

Sometimes just an electrical contact cleaner and working  the key will be enouph. As far as the short go's it depends on the guage of the wire and how much contact it's makeing,but a concearn non the less because if the key is off there should be no drain. This light you speak of is a good possibility for this. It may be wired direct bypassing the key and have a bad contact drawing power at all times.

As mentioned previously, I confirmed that the light does turn off when the seat is closed. However, I only tested this during the day; it's possible that there would still be current flowing through the bulb below the limit where it'd be visible during the day.

For what it's worth, I removed the bulb and put a freshly charged battery in the scooter last night. After a brief (10 minute) drive to work, I removed the battery, let it sit for an hour or so, and measured the voltage. It's right at 12.80V (after another hour, it dropped slightly to 12.79V, which is probably within the meter's margin of error), so it doesn't seem like it'd be terribly drained.

At lunch today, I'll hook the battery back up and measure how much current is flowing with the key turned off. If it's a non-zero value, then there's definitely something going on. I'll also put the bulb back in to see how much it'd be drawing, and if it'd be plausible for the bulb to drain the battery over a few days.

[art]

 Sounds like your on the right track. You have more electrical skills than I do 

[heypete]

Sounds like your on the right track. You have more electrical skills than I do 

Maybe, but I'm merely an amateur. I just like experimenting, so it's fun to test various possibilities to narrow things down.

If it wasn't inconvenient and expensive, I'd almost want things to go wrong so I could diagnose and fix them.

[axy]

At lunch today, I'll hook the battery back up and measure how much current is flowing with the key turned off. If it's a non-zero value, then there's definitely something going on. I'll also put the bulb back in to see how much it'd be drawing, and if it'd be plausible for the bulb to drain the battery over a few days.

Not exactly. If nothing else, your scoot probably has a watch/clock that might have its own battery or not, so this method of determining current draining will not be exactly infallible...unless you are sure the current should be zero with ignition key off.

I do not know why is this space called "met in box". I might as well call it "under seat storage space". However, that is how the manual refers to it, so does the light bulb in the instrument cluster that shows if the seat is not properly closed down.

To be honest, English is my third language (out of four I speak), so I do not waste a lot of time pondering about language syntax and semantics, except in case of the last language I am trying to learn.

Btw, read the first post here: http://scooterbbs.net/board/DCForumID11/4183.html

[heypete]

Not exactly. If nothing else, your scoot probably has a watch/clock that might have its own battery or not, so this method of determining current draining will not be exactly infallible...unless you are sure the current should be zero with ignition key off.

True, it does have a clock, but I'm think it has its own battery -- it's remained on and accurate even after several days without the main battery installed.

Good point about the current maybe not normally being zero. I suppose I should should be checking for non-negligible current drain, rather than non-zero.

I do not know why is this space called "met in box". I might as well call it "under seat storage space". However, that is how the manual refers to it, so does the light bulb in the instrument cluster that shows if the seat is not properly closed down.

To be honest, English is my third language (out of four I speak), so I do not waste a lot of time pondering about language syntax and semantics, except in case of the last language I am trying to learn.

Btw, read the first post here: http://scooterbbs.net/board/DCForumID11/4183.html

Languages are not my strongpoint, so I'm quite impressed that you're able to speak four.

I'm tempted to write to Kymco and ask them what the heck MET-IN means.

[sidthesloth]

My take is an abbreviation of material in box, given that the manufacturer does not speak english as a native tongue. In their own language it probably sounds as right as car boot to us Aussies, or trunk to Americans. Just my guess. Axy, four languages, impress the hell outa me.

[axy]

Guys, it's a drawback (or advantage, depending on your point of view...) of being a part of nation of just 4.5 mil people.
People in small countries often speak more than one language.

Furthermore, people from my country can pretty much understand five different languages of ex. Yugoslav republics + understand some of most Slavic languages like Czech, Slovak, Polish, Russian and Bulgarian.

It's a mess.

[heypete]

Follow-up: after removing the light bulb, the battery remained fully charged (only dropped about 0.1 volts over the weekend, which was probably not due to any load on the battery draining it, but just the surface charge wearing off) over an entire weekend and the following week.

Very odd. I'll conduct further tests to see if it's the bulb itself, or something in the wires leading to the bulb.

[sidthesloth]

Maybe the light is coming on when the seat is closed. Good that you found the problem. Hey, maybe it is a design flaw and that is why they never put the bulbs in, cheaper than modifying thdm loom?