Found out what was draining my battery....

[Kewl X5]

Ok, it was the FINAL STAGE RESISTOR for the HVAC blower. BTW, the new automatic tranny....working well. Last week, car wouldn't start and you can see the dash lights dim as I engaged the starter. Yes, got a new battery last November (Interstate battery with 800 CCA) Anyhow, I had a battery booster and started the car with it. Got it checked by local mechanic and it appears that after I shut off the car, the blower for HVAC system would go on & off even though the engine was off. No, he ruled out the battery otherwise, that is where I got the battery which had a 7 year warranty. I did have the final stage resistor for the HVAC replaced under warranty once (because it was doing funky things with the fan back in 2002).

Anyhow, even though the car was off for a while, the final stage resistor for the HVAC was burning hot....obviously, it was drawing more power....I'll take a picture of it, but usually when the HVAC blower is running, it also helps cool off the resistor. The new final stage resistor has more cooling fins and looks updated/upgraded from my old resistor made by Valeo dated 12/01.

Hopefully, that was it and I'll see if the X5 will start tomorrow morning.

[PersonaNonGrata]

Good luck Kewl and hopefully the AC will keep you as your namesake.

[SANguru]

you sure it's not you keeping the music on and dancing to the spice girls to relive you younger days?? NEXT!!

[Kewl X5]

Dang, the secret's out!

No, it really was RUN DMC that took all the juice out of the battery!!

Originally Posted by SANguru

you sure it's not you keeping the music on and dancing to the spice girls to relive you younger days?? NEXT!!

[SANguru]

Liar! you know you had the karoake machine out and singing "baby hit me one more time!" You know you singing will drain any battery!

Originally Posted by Kewl X5

Dang, the secret's out!

No, it really was RUN DMC that took all the juice out of the battery!!

[Kewl X5]

Well, here is the bugger that drained the battery. (Sorry camera phone pic). With the new final stage resistor, the a/c actually works better because the fan speed is not varying randomly like it did.

Also, forgot to take a pic of the new FSR, but here is a pic from xoutpost.com's article section re: FSR replacement (great article) The revised FSR appears to have more cooling fins and hopefully won't fail in the near future.

[elric75]

Same thing happened to me several months back. Folks, if you ever notice your AC fan speed randomly fluctuating, get your final stage resistor fixed ASAP or it WILL kill your battery eventually.

[X5Flyboy]

Yes, this is a typical thing on early models - It was on of the things that the dealer found when I had them go over the '01 right after I bought it.