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[diesel16]

I have an Omega B 2.0DTi estate with battery drain problems and I am running out of ideas. When the car ‘goes to sleep’ there is a 215mA drain. I have replaced the battery, isolated the starter, alternator, and then proceeded through all the fused circuits. Here comes my confusion, on the fuse board below the steering wheel if I remove fuse 12 or 20 I get a very slight reduction, when fuse 12 is removed after a few seconds the cabin blower starts at full blast and then reduces to slow and continues to run. When both fuses are removed together the drain drops to a few mA’s and the fan stops. I also have a airbag light, whether this is related I haven’t got that far.
When locking the car normally all lights and displays extinguish, vanity and glove box lights are off, removing radio has no effect.
Running out of ideas, can somebody find me some inspiration.
Many thanks in advance.

[freecall666]

dose it have an amp fitted ?? have you checked the arial amplifier??
dose the light go out after doors are locked?
there are alot of stuff that can use the battery up
have you tryed removing all fuse's or have you had a meter on battery  to find power drop time
alarm and immoboliser will use power when locked,

[Boditza]

isn't this a powersounder issue??? check the maintainance guides and see how to disconect it and then see if it is still deraining

[Kevin Wood]

Welcome to the forum.

Do bear in mind that there is a timer that continues to power some of the accessories for a few minutes after closing all the doors. It might be worth closing the car up with an ammeter on the battery, then go and have a cup of tea. If it's still drawing 200 mA when you come back, I'd say you have a problem. You may find it's dropped to an acceptable level, though.

If you do have a problem, it's really going to be a process of disconnecting devices until you find the problem. The power sounder is a good place to start, but get yourself a wiring diagram and work through each of the large fuses in the engine bay, then, when you have found the offender, start on the smaller fusebox fuses that are fed from it, until you find the circuit that's causing the problem.

Kevin

[diesel16]

Thanks for the replies guys, powersounder is already gone and all lights, extinguish as they should. The drain quoted is after leaving the car for a couple of hours with the ammeter in line with the battery. I haven't looked at the aerial amplifier, would this not power down with the radio removed? The isolating of fuses in order is the process I employed but as I say it is not cleared by one fuse. I have to remove either the two right hand large fuses in the engine bay or fuse 12 and 20 together under the steering wheel to drop the bulk of the drain to 15/20mA which I think is acceptable for a 'sleeping' alrm system. James.

[Dave DND]

Thanks for the replies guys, powersounder is already gone and all lights, extinguish as they should. The drain quoted is after leaving the car for a couple of hours with the ammeter in line with the battery. I haven't looked at the aerial amplifier, would this not power down with the radio removed? The isolating of fuses in order is the process I employed but as I say it is not cleared by one fuse. I have to remove either the two right hand large fuses in the engine bay or fuse 12 and 20 together under the steering wheel to drop the bulk of the drain to 15/20mA which I think is acceptable for a 'sleeping' alrm system. James.

If standard radio fitted, Yes, if aftermarket radio badly fitted, then possibly not.

[Kevin Wood]

F20 is fed by one of the jumbo fuses you removed.

F12 is fed by the other.

F20 feeds Alarm/Central Locking, rear seat heating, sunscreen motor.

I would expect a bit of drain through this fuse due to the alarm.

F12 feeds a whole host of stuff

Diag connector, hazard light switch, instrument panel, MID/CID/GID, Climate Panel, alarm feed to turn signal relay, Radio, Telematics, Interior lamp, Seat memory.

Kevin

[Dave DND]

2 Questions:

1st to diesel16 , what stereo do you have fitted ?

2nd, to everybody else, and apologies for the can of worms here, but what is an acceptable current drain in the Omega ?

[Kevin Wood]

2nd, to everybody else, and apologies for the can of worms here, but what is an acceptable current drain in the Omega ?

There is an "official" statement in TIS somewhere which I will try to locate. I think it mentions 80mA as being the figure above which there's a problem. I'm trying to remember what I've measured in the past.  :-/

Kevin

[Dave DND]

2nd, to everybody else, and apologies for the can of worms here, but what is an acceptable current drain in the Omega ?

There is an "official" statement in TIS somewhere which I will try to locate. I think it mentions 80mA as being the figure above which there's a problem. I'm trying to remember what I've measured in the past.  :-/

Kevin

Thought that there would be an "official" figure somewhere - I know it can vary considerably from vehicle to vehicle, and some vehicles, BMW X5 for example, do not appear to be able to tolerate ANY form of drain whatsoever - in fact its now advised when fitting external multimedia to them that all memory supplies are put on a relay as even the backup drain from a DVD player remembering where the disc stopeed is enough to send them over the edge.

Of course, a "real car" like the Omega is man enough to take a bit more punishment than that - but just curious as to what the "official" line was.

[diesel16]

Hi Dave DND, The radio is the standard factory fit that came in the car, radio and single CD drive.

[Dave DND]

Hi Dave DND, The radio is the standard factory fit that came in the car, radio and single CD drive.

That doesn`t really help - every stereo fitted to every car at the time of production is a "standard" one

My database has over 60,000 different models of "standard" stereo - which makes it a little difficult to work out which one you have?

CDR2005?  Delco or VDO? Have you tried to remove it, and checked the drain then?

[Andy H]

Thanks for the replies guys, powersounder is already gone and all lights, extinguish as they should. The drain quoted is after leaving the car for a couple of hours with the ammeter in line with the battery. I haven't looked at the aerial amplifier, would this not power down with the radio removed? The isolating of fuses in order is the process I employed but as I say it is not cleared by one fuse. I have to remove either the two right hand large fuses in the engine bay or fuse 12 and 20 together under the steering wheel to drop the bulk of the drain to 15/20mA which I think is acceptable for a 'sleeping' alrm system. James.

If standard radio fitted, Yes, if aftermarket radio badly fitted, then possibly not.

The feed for the aerial amplifier on the Omega also seems to go to the information display which blanks the middle line ready to display text from the radio (and wakes up the display if the ignition is off).

If the display isn't lit up then I would be reasonably confident that the aerial amplifier wasn't powered up either. (with the proviso that 'never make assumptions, assume makes an ass out of me and U')

[Dave DND]

Thanks for the replies guys, powersounder is already gone and all lights, extinguish as they should. The drain quoted is after leaving the car for a couple of hours with the ammeter in line with the battery. I haven't looked at the aerial amplifier, would this not power down with the radio removed? The isolating of fuses in order is the process I employed but as I say it is not cleared by one fuse. I have to remove either the two right hand large fuses in the engine bay or fuse 12 and 20 together under the steering wheel to drop the bulk of the drain to 15/20mA which I think is acceptable for a 'sleeping' alrm system. James.

If standard radio fitted, Yes, if aftermarket radio badly fitted, then possibly not.

The feed for the aerial amplifier on the Omega also seems to go to the information display which blanks the middle line ready to display text from the radio (and wakes up the display if the ignition is off).

If the display isn't lit up then I would be reasonably confident that the aerial amplifier wasn't powered up either. (with the proviso that 'never make assumptions, assume makes an ass out of me and U')

Other Vx models, particularly Corsa and Astra can do wired things to the info display if the internals of the aerial base have gone short circuit - still draws current, but will not necessarily power on. Omega has a different style of aerial amp, but theory may still be the same?

 :-/

[Andy H]

Thanks for the replies guys, powersounder is already gone and all lights, extinguish as they should. The drain quoted is after leaving the car for a couple of hours with the ammeter in line with the battery. I haven't looked at the aerial amplifier, would this not power down with the radio removed? The isolating of fuses in order is the process I employed but as I say it is not cleared by one fuse. I have to remove either the two right hand large fuses in the engine bay or fuse 12 and 20 together under the steering wheel to drop the bulk of the drain to 15/20mA which I think is acceptable for a 'sleeping' alrm system. James.

If standard radio fitted, Yes, if aftermarket radio badly fitted, then possibly not.

The feed for the aerial amplifier on the Omega also seems to go to the information display which blanks the middle line ready to display text from the radio (and wakes up the display if the ignition is off).

If the display isn't lit up then I would be reasonably confident that the aerial amplifier wasn't powered up either. (with the proviso that 'never make assumptions, assume makes an ass out of me and U')

Other Vx models, particularly Corsa and Astra can do wired things to the info display if the internals of the aerial base have gone short circuit - still draws current, but will not necessarily power on. Omega has a different style of aerial amp, but theory may still be the same?

 :-/

I have only owned saloons with the aerial amp kept nice and dry under the parcel shelf.

Am I right in thinking that the estate has a roof mounted aerial with the amplifier in the base (like the Corsa & Astra) ?