18 days into a 3 week holiday, things were mostly well until this morning, sigh, here we go again....Parked the truck at the campsite day before yesterday afternoon. Didn't run it yesterday. Went to head out this morning and the truck wouldn't start, batteries were dead. Enough juice to make the solenoid click a bit, that's all.What the heck? Feb 4 this year, 2 new batteries, March 8, new alternator.When I tried to start it I had a weird smell come out the AC/heat ducts. Not quite a burnt electrical smell but similar.I'm baffled here. Thing was running fine until this.Pulled the negative terminals, put on an ammeter, looked at readout. Started at 1.67A, bled down to about .11A and stayed there. Left the batteries disconnected for about 7-8 minutes, hooked them up and ran jumper cables to my TT house batteries. Gave it a couple hours for the converter to charge them a bit.Got it started, ran it a few minutes, alternator got hot rather fast, but it's working so I get that.Took it for a run for about a half hour, seems to be ok now. Except that weird smell...It's been a couple hours shut off now, going to go back out, pull the negs and do the ammeter test again.My question regarding all this:What is the nominal draw in amps that should I be reading? That is, the normal amount of parasitic drain? Milliamps I guess, not amps.(TV in sig)

Brain lapse...Think I'm reading my multimeter wrong.I set it to DC mA. On the 30 setting of the dial it settles to .1mA

Did you power the converter from shore power or from a generator? reason to ask is:If you are off grid, and you leave the 7-pin connected while parked engine off, your Chev will be "live" with the engine battery in parallel with the trailer batteries. So that could be good or bad for the truck battery depending on whether the trailer batteries are being recharged or run down.Generally with a Chev, disconnect the 7-pin when you are parked for very long.

start the truck take it for a drive, run every single accessory you can.shut it down disconnect battery put meter inline and wait 15 minutes, it should drop,remember most meters are fused at 500ma or lower for the Ma rating, if u saw 2 amps and tested it on the ma setting you prolly blew the fuse. check the fusenormal ma draw is somewhere in the area of 30-40ma. you should let the vehicle sit over night and check it in the morning as well, with not opening the doors or touching anything that will power the computers back up. that said a 100ma if that is remotely accurate should not even come close to draining 2 batteries in 1 day

BFL13 wrote:Did you power the converter from shore power or from a generator? reason to ask is:...snipFull hookups, truck is disconnected.

LittleBill, My ammeter says 10A max.I ran it there initially for the reading in my first post, just to be sure I didn't blow something.Once I saw it wasn't drawing a huge amount I set it to mA on the 30 range of the dial. It began at around 70 and settled down to .1 mA after about 30 seconds. Held it there for about 1.5 minutes and it stayed there.

Batteries drained to dead, what is nominal drain on truck?

Dick_B
Explorer
Aug 22, 2019
I was having that same problem so I bought a NOCO Genius car starter. It's not a battery charger but a small powerful Lithium ion battery small enough to `almost' fit in a glove box.
It was worth the approx. $100 to know I'd be able to start the truck every morning.
P.S. I also got a new battery to replace the one that was almost three years old.
BFL13
Explorer II
Aug 22, 2019
Perhaps one of the two truck batteries has a bad cell or whatever and is killing the other.
BobsYourUncle
Nomad
Aug 22, 2019
LittleBill,
My ammeter says 10A max.
I ran it there initially for the reading in my first post, just to be sure I didn't blow something.
Once I saw it wasn't drawing a huge amount I set it to mA on the 30 range of the dial. It began at around
70 and settled down to .1 mA after about 30 seconds. Held it there for about 1.5 minutes and it stayed there.
BobsYourUncle
Nomad
Aug 22, 2019
BFL13 wrote:
Did you power the converter from shore power or from a generator? reason to ask is:...snip

Full hookups, truck is disconnected.
LittleBill
Explorer
Aug 22, 2019
start the truck take it for a drive, run every single accessory you can.

shut it down disconnect battery put meter inline and wait 15 minutes, it should drop,

remember most meters are fused at 500ma or lower for the Ma rating, if u saw 2 amps and tested it on the ma setting you prolly blew the fuse. check the fuse

normal ma draw is somewhere in the area of 30-40ma. you should let the vehicle sit over night and check it in the morning as well, with not opening the doors or touching anything that will power the computers back up. that said a 100ma if that is remotely accurate should not even come close to draining 2 batteries in 1 day
BFL13
Explorer II
Aug 22, 2019
Did you power the converter from shore power or from a generator? reason to ask is:

If you are off grid, and you leave the 7-pin connected while parked engine off, your Chev will be "live" with the engine battery in parallel with the trailer batteries. So that could be good or bad for the truck battery depending on whether the trailer batteries are being recharged or run down.

Generally with a Chev, disconnect the 7-pin when you are parked for very long.
BobsYourUncle
Nomad
Aug 22, 2019
Brain lapse...
Think I'm reading my multimeter wrong.
I set it to DC mA. On the 30 setting of the dial it settles to .1mA

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Batteries drained to dead, what is nominal drain on truck?

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