Testing current draw

[Larry C Leung]

I agree, the 17 mA draw shouldn't drain a fully charged (and charging)
battery. Your calculations look good, didn't bother due to time and my
general experience of mA draws off of auto batteries. BTW, the typical
dash clock has a similar current draw as the typical battery powered
quartz clock has on a AA battery in the home, and those usually go for
about a year.

LL - NY

On Fri, 27 Apr 2001 09:18:00 +0100 Simon Allcorn
<Simon.Allcorn at CARTESIAN.co.uk> writes:
>Huw, Larry,
>
>	That (Huw's assumption that the battery / charger may not be 
>working
>correctly) seems quite sensible, lets do some ball park figures:
>
>Current draw = 0.017 A (0.204 Watts)
>
>Assume the battery is 48Ah (I think this is about the capacity of a 
>normal
>battery - I'm sure it won't be any less)
>
>If the battery is fully charged then it should last with a drain of 
>0.017A
>for:
>
>48 / 0.017 = 2823 hours = 117 days  = 16.8 weeks !
>
>Simon
>
>> considering how low a draw that is, even if it slightly higher than 
>has
>> been said here is appropriate, I would investigate your charging 
>system
>> integrity as well.  Specifically, I believe the type 44 has, among 
>its
>> many unique and aggravating traits, a splice in the main battery 
>wire
>> under the passenger side carpet (?) which is trouble prone.  Check 
>the
>> battery ground and alternator functions as well, of course.
>> 
>> The type 44 consumes a *lot* of electricity while running, so a 
>poor
>> conductor to the battery might result in minimal recharging, and 
>your
>> small "off use" curent draw could be enough to flatten your battery. 
> Do
>> this over and over again and you shorten the battery life, as well.  
>How
>> old *is* the battery, anyway?
>> 
>> -- 
>> Huw Powell
>> 
>> http://www.humanspeakers.com/audi/
>> 
>> http://www.humanthoughts.org/