TRUCK KEEPS DYING EVERY OTHER WEEK

[HUMMERICH23]

My truck's battery first petered out on my Christmas eve (mind you the battery and truck are less than one year old ). It was fine and then died on me two weeks later and then did it again another two weeks later. Took it to dealer and got a new battery and everything checked out ok and they thought possible bad battery. Then it died on me again two days ago two weeks after i just got the new battery.

So right now my truck has been at the dealer for two days where they did a leech test/parasitic test, and an amperage test over night where it came back NEGATIVE for any problems. They cannot figure it out and the dealership's manager remember early on some of the H2's fuses were bad or something and pins or something were messed up causing the battery to drain but other than that there are NO TSBs or any routes they know to go down.

At first i was worried it was my Hot Tune on my pcm messing something up, but i have had that since July and thought why now would it do that now and my only other thought it was the Nav running constantly but all the test came back negative for any drains. So i am just waiting patiently with my H3 alpha as my rental and hoping anyone here might have a clue of what they should do next????


Richard

[Rene S. Nielsen]

Hmm I have the same problem, something is draining my battery too.

I'm starting to suspect the pac_audio thing for my Kenwood head unit.

Next time I take the center console out I will try to add a switch so I can disable the complete system when I leave the truck to see if this helps.

Rene

[HUMMERICH23]

Yeah the weird thing is it is absolutely fine for the periods between the battery dying. It will start no problem and then all of a sudden just out of the blue its dead. This last time i just drove it at 11pm with absolutely no problem and went out to start it at 6:30am the next day and wham dead.


One thing i dont understand is when it wont start, all of the electronics, lights, Nav, dashboard, etc stuff turns on and is fine. No dimming of lights, no power loss to run those things but turn the key and zero, nothing.

Richard

[Mark805]

This happened to me on my 07 H2. I would have to jump sart my rig about once a week. I took it to the dealership and they told me they would look at it the next day. they gave me a loaner H2 and off I went to work. That evening I called and they said there was nothing wrong with my truck adn i coud get it in the morning.

The next morning, I drive down to get it and meet with the service manager. He grabs my keys and walks back up to me and tells me the truck wont start.

So he decided to replace the factory battery and all is well with the world. He mentioned there was a batch of factory batteries that seemed to have problems and this is what he based the replacement on. Haven't had the problem again and its been about 1.5 years on the new battery.

He stated they checked the battery and charging system and all seemed to check out, so he was confused but glad to see i was happy.

Have em swap out the battery, I bet that'll fix yours too.

[timgco]

my 07 had an issue with the factory stereo/NAV drawing power and also had something to do with the drsd seat module at the same time. I lookd though my service records but could not find that exact information.

...and yes, there have been pleanty of us that have replaced the factory battery due to bad cell.

[HUMTECH]

Is your onstar activated. I have run into issues with onstar when its not activated the module wakes up periodically and searches for a signal, when it cant find one it stays awake and keeps searching. I have also had a few radios that stay powered up, even though they look off, they are still drawing around 200mA when staying "awake". Very intermittant.

[HUMMERICH23]

Still at the dealer and still nothing. They did pick up on normal driving the Volt Meter Plunges down to 10-12 range and they thought that was odd. Other than that still no new news and i guess everything GM Tech has told them has tested negative or they never really even tested it.

I have noticed the volt meter dropping off in December but thought it was normal and all the problems started in Jan. Before the Volt Meter would always stay strong at 14 and never fluctuated but i have noticed since the battery problems started once the battery was new or recharged from the dealer the Meter Dropped to 10-12 but if you jumped it from being dead it would jump up to 14 i assume to charge the battery but it seems once it gets charged the system takes a crap. I thought this was normal as the manual says the volt meter will change so i never thought of it as a problem untill the dealer stated it might be.

Richard

[madmike]

Wow , I never thought this would be such a viscious issue. When AM Gen cant even fix the problem. Im old school, I would probably put a high amp relay on the battery which would disconnect it from the rest of the car every time you stop it. Although you would lose your radio channels What a nightmare. Also I would disconnect the battery and reconnect it to see if it drains. There has to be a light on or something. Good luck!!!:

[madmike]

Meditating on this post and missed the obvious. Your Alternator was fluctuating. When running , your alternator should be charging the battery as well as running all your electronics. New batteries? No drain? really sounds like a bad alt. Im sure any local auto parts will check it for you. Although I usually place a voltmeter across the battery to see if its charging. I believe it should read above 13 volts constant. Seems your truck is running off battery until it dies.

[HUMMERICH23]

I wish someone told the service department it was that easy because its going on THREE WEEKS they have had my truck and NOTHING. I am going to flip a gasket tomorrow when i head back to the dealer. They state the problem is too intermittent to catch and pull fuses to see what stops the drain. There has to be a test they can do besides waiting every 5 days for the drain to kick in and miss the drain then wait some more and tell me nothing yet.

Richard

[[__--MUD--__]]

I feel for you... I'm still fighting same battle. I didn't catch if you ever said what the amp draw is on the battery or the year of the truck. Mines an 04 w/ 350mah draw. I've pulled my remote start, and bypass module, heated wipers and hid lights. I've yanked every fuse in the enging bay and interior. My issues started around the 1st of the year. I still think the old onstar module is a potential problem w/ the network unavailable. I've had a few service people say they didn't think the onstar was fused and is wired direct to battery for survivability in an accident.

I found this the other day, its right in my draw range..gonna start disconnecting it tonight.

Condition/Concern:

During battery parasitic drain testing, there may be some confusion as to the normal power consumption reading from the OnStar? system.


Recommendation/Instructions:

When performing current draw tests it is important to understand the power cycles of the various OnStar? systems. All OnStar? customers with currently active vehicles have digital/analog cellular capability. A green status LED on the OnStar? keypad normally indicates an active OnStar? account. A red LED indicates a system DTC. On Gen 6 and later systems, a clear, or "dark" LED may indicated the OnStar? system has been deactivated or may possibly have a no power concern/no communication.

The OnStar? system will stay powered up after ignition off for an extended time in order to allow for remote services like door unlock, horn honk, light flash, etc to take place as requested by the customer. Power cycle (also referred to as DRX) times vary depending on the generation of the OnStar? system. Technicians may identify the system generation by using a Tech 2 (Body>VCIM>Module ID Information>Module Information 2) or by using www.onstarenrollment.com.

All Gen 6, Gen 7, and 8 systems are powered up continuously for 48 hours from ignition off. After the 48 hours the Gen 6 and some Gen 7 power off; Gen 7.xxL, and all Gen 8 systems will enter a 9 minute OFF 1 minute ON power cycle for an additional 72 hours. At the beginning and end of the 1 minute ON stage, you may or may not experience a short spike of current at the beginning and at the end. This allows for calls from OnStar to be received by the system. After 120 hours from ignition off, these systems then completely power off.

The expected current draw of the OnStar? module is:
? IGN ON - 240 to 400 mA
? IGN OFF - 3 to 20 mA for 48 hours
? IGN OFF - after 48 hours (120 hours on specified VCPs) - 0.2 to 0.8 mA
? During extended voltage monitoring for platform battery parasitic it is possible that you may see a voltage spike caused by a cellular registration call that was triggered by the local cellular system, or that OnStar? has set a monthly trigger for a vehicle data upload call for the OnStar? Vehicle Diagnostic email upload. Note that in analog cellular markets all module generations completely power down after 48 hours. You can contact Technical Assistance to find out if your dealership cellular market or the customer's home cellular market still has analog service.

[HUMTECH]

On an 04 the INFO fuse is for the onstar