evie

hope this is the right forum. i drive the s as my daily, and last week i drove home from work, got changed to go to class, and when i got back in my car and put the key in the ignition there was nothing. no lights, no clicks, nothing. i turned the key a few more times and saw the dash light up very faintly and briefly. cabin lights were on. i thought my battery must have died (optima yellow top bought 2 years ago) - took it to the auto parts place, they told me my battery needed replacing.

i bought a new one but brought the old one home and put it on the charger. it charged up okay, dropped the old battery back in the car and i see lights but again just fast clicking, no cranking when i turned the ignition on and hit the start button. i noticed the car clicks wildly when i depress the brake pedal, and after a few (10-15 seconds), the lights on the dash come on.

today i dropped in the new battery, and it did the same thing as when the car stopped starting originally. get in the car, cabin lights on, turn the key in the ignition and everything goes black. no clicks, no cranks. wait a few seconds, try again and the lights start to come on and the car beeps and clicks but no cranking.

i took a video of the clicking noises / weird behavior with the dash lights. from what I've read maybe its starter or fuse or something? but, i don't know where to look or how to check it. any ideas or suggestions?

[media]http://youtu.be/-XDDUxSFShk[/media]

thanks in advance !

AE_Racer

Sounds like a ground issue. Follow the negative cable from the battery and make sure it has a clean connection. If thats good, do the same with the power cable. Iirc it goes into the fuse box. Its possible the bolt maybe backed out a bit and could be giving you power issues.

FYI I had a yellow top in my car and it had similar issues. Actually two of them. But I got both used so could have been coincidence they just died relatively quickly.

evie

thanks ! i checked, both connections look okay. i cleaned out the terminal posts and connectors with baking soda / water mix, and tried again - got the starter to "click" once, but again, everything went dark. checked the fuse box in front of the battery compartment, no blown fuses. stereo works, cabin lights work, attempted to turn on the headlights and everything turned off. also noted that the cabin lights kind of "pulse" between bright and dim.. weird.. i put the new battery on the charger just to see what it does, its charging and claims to be at 75% (voltage reading 13.6, amps ~3.8). with the old battery the charger shows very low current through the battery (0.3 - 0.6 amp) - when i first hooked it up again this morning it showed no current and full charge. so maybe my battery is bad, but it looks like something else might be wrong too..

the one that just died is my second yellow top.. i had bought one two years ago, forgot and left a cabin light on and went away for two weeks which killed it - got a replacement, and this one's dead but so far i don't have a good explanation for it.