Got a '96 Grand Voyager that until last night had never shown any problems with the charging system. Last night though, I unlocked the door with my key (didn't have the remote handy), and when I opened the door, the alarm started going off... okay, no problem... put the key in the ignition, turn it... And everything went near-dead. Nasty click-click-click from under the dash, lights really dim, not enough juice to start. Turn it off, get out, close the door, open the hood... underhood light comes on bright... open the door, and all lights dim... try to start, and not enough juice. Managed to jump-start it, but all the way home it was behaving strangely - slowing to a stop, the idle would drop, almost die, lights all dim... then pick up and idle nicely again. I could turn on lights, blower... all fine until I turn on the defroster, and everything would dim again. Got it home, put a meter on the battery... 14.5 volts. Lights on, blower on, all fine... defroster on, and it drops to 5V and then back up to just under 12V, until I rev it up a bit, and then it's back to charging. Turned the engine off, and everything went dead again, just barely enough juice to activate the power locks. Sounds like an alternator problem at this point, but when I started working on it this morning things really started getting weird: I put a charger on it, and the underhood light blinks fast. I put a meter on it, and I read under 12V on fast-charge, down to 10V on slow-charge. WTF? Disonnect the charger, and the clicking begins again under the dash. Thinking maybe the battery has a shorted cell or something, I disconnected the negative terminal... now putting the charger on the battery gives a solid 14V on slow- or fast-charge. So the battery seems to be fine. Without further testing, alternator seems to be alright... it's almost like there's a short or something else intermittant drawing tons of power. Anyone have any other ideas? --- avast! Antivirus: Outbound message clean. Virus Database (VPS): 0607-2, 02/16/2006 Tested on: 2/18/2006 1:08:44 PM avast! - copyright (c) 1988-2005 ALWIL Software. http://www.avast.com
Last night though, I unlocked the door with my key (didn't have >the remote handy), and when I opened the door, the alarm started >going off... okay, no problem... put the key in the ignition, turn it... Bad connection, most likely at a battery cable.
