84 Vanagon Parasitic Draw

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sped372
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Location: Waunakee, WI
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Re: 84 Vanagon Parasitic Draw

Post by sped372 » Thu Mar 24, 2016 5:44 am

It's actually tucked up under the dash pod. I popped the cover and pulled the pcb - nothing obvious to report. I'm soliciting the help of an EE friend of mine, just out of curiosity. I'm interested to know if there is a design flaw (did it always do this? I'd be shocked) or if a faulty component is to blame.

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I noted one diode that measured 'differently' on my multimeter compared to the rest (red arrow), but I didn't desolder anything from the board so the test is suspect at best.

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I also noted the hot (+) and cold (-) terminals for the brake monitoring circuit. This is what lets 30mA bleed at all times. I get a reading on my diode setting on my multimeter (both polarities) but no audible 'beep' - whatever that means.

Regardless, further exploration is just a novelty to me at this point. The important thing is I have eliminated the parasitic draw and won't kill my battery while parked any more.
1971 Karmann Ghia - 1600 DP
1984 Westfalia - 1.9 WBX

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Amskeptic
IAC "Help Desk"
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Re: 84 Vanagon Parasitic Draw

Post by Amskeptic » Thu Mar 24, 2016 2:13 pm

sped372 wrote:It's actually tucked up under the dash pod. \
I also noted the hot (+) and cold (-) terminals for the brake monitoring circuit.
Wherever . . . so now you can look for any solder joints that have a small halo crack where the pin sticks through the solder and just remelt the joint briefly . . . like I did for my Lexus LS400's ECU :cyclopsani:

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BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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