Sorry, long post as there is a fair bit of background.
The vehicle I am having issues with is a 2006 Toyota Sienna with over 156,000 miles. Currently, the vehicle cannot start, classic symptoms of a dead battery: wife went to start it, barely turned over, then everything died, nothing electrical works.
Now, for the important background, which I think ties in to some potential underlying problem areas.
First, the immediate background. Battery is about 4 months old. Branded as an "EverStart" from Walmart, but made by East Penn Deka. Dead battery symptoms on this battery first appeared about a week ago, after we were absent on a month long trip. I didn't have it hooked to a charge maintainer, and forgot to disconnect the battery cable. At that point, the dead battery didn't surprise me.
To revive the battery, we used a very old charger that had a 50 amp start option. Got the vehicle home from where we parked while on vacation, then hooked it up to my own automatic "smart" battery charger. Seemed to work, until a couple of days ago, the battery died again.
So, thinking that it may be an alternator not charging, I tested with a multimeter.
Some additional relevant background: vehicle likely needs injectors cleaned, and is overdue for new spark plugs. This is relevant, as the ECU remapped itself to accommodate for this, however, every time the battery dies, it resets the ECU to factory, leading to poor idle until the ECU relearns. (I will address this issue separately, and this isn't directly part of the problem).
On to the multimeter results: after recharging enough to start with the external charger, I tested with the multimeter reading over 14 volts, while the vehicle did its initial elevated idle. When it dropped down to normal idle, which was rough, and barely at 400 rpm, due to the ECU being reset, the voltage reading was 12.5. With my son reading the multimeter, I manually bumped the RPMs to about 1000 with the accelerator, and the readings slowly crept up to near 14 volts. The results make me suspect the alternator isn't the culprit as initally thought. The ECU seemed to relearn quite quickly, so don't think it was a case of idle remaining too low after the boost, plus all the driving would have bumped the RPMs high enough for charging.
Now more background: connected to the battery are two more leads off positive, for the trailer wiring and brake controller added many years ago to the vehicle. Suspecting that there may be a very slight short in the aged wiring, I disconnected those to eliminate that issue, as I continued to monitor it over the next few days.
I also rigged the charger so that when it is at home, it is easy for my wife to plug it in to fully charge the battery, as the cord hangs from the front like a block heater cord would.
This morning, the vehicle didn't start again, same dead battery symptoms, but this time, it was plugged in to a charger (overnight), and should have been fully charged. All electrical load as off, as I ensured all accessories were turned off, and that the parking brake was on to prevent the daytime running lights coming on.
This leads me to believe that the 4 weeks sitting around has actually fried this battery.
But..., there is even more background, the entire battery history before this one:
I replaced the original battery in 2009. I suspected I had to because I had boneheadedly left the interior lights on too many times (manual switch on), and the latest time was just as temperatures dropped below freezing in the fall. Only open choice that evening with batteries was Walmart, and I had to get my wife up and running for the next morning. So off I went, and got their then branded "Energizer" made by Johnson Controls. Also that year, though I made no connection until recently as a possible cause, was all the trailer and brake controller wiring was installed that summer.
This battery lasted until around January 2012. Acid spewing everywhere, it gave up the ghost, but not before severly corroding the factory wiring leads. I had to replace the damaged section with very heavy gauge wire. Fighting Walmart on their warranty, they agreed to replace under warranty based on the manufacturer date sticker, and got a replacement, branded now as "EverStart" made by JCI.
But the battery woes weren't over. Again, the battery died in early 2014. While out of town this time, of course. The local Walmart there agreed to exchange under warranty. Another EverStart JCI.
And again, issues with that battery, with it being replaced again this March, with another EverStart, this time made by East Penn Deka.
Each time, the alternator tested okay with its output. A couple of times, with the different batteries over the years, there were some instances the battery died, but was successfully revived, while towing with the tent trailer, running the 12 volt fridge. Beefing up the trailer side wiring gauge, and avoiding running the 12 volt fridge seemed to elimate the issue, and so the trailer wiring wasn't suspect at that point.
The van was retired from towing after doing a final trip to take the tent trailer out to storage last fall (towing has been taken over by a different vehicle of mine).
Based on the evidence, I suspect that this is where I am now:
There is some sort of parasitic draw, probably a slight short in the trailer wiring.
Sitting 4 weeks without use completely fried this battery.
It only accepted charges for a short while, and even then, not very well, until now, it isn't accepting any charge at all.
Remedy is probably to replace this battery, but also completely disconnect the trailer wiring, to prevent this from occuring again.
Is this the right track, or am I completely missing something?
The vehicle I am having issues with is a 2006 Toyota Sienna with over 156,000 miles. Currently, the vehicle cannot start, classic symptoms of a dead battery: wife went to start it, barely turned over, then everything died, nothing electrical works.
Now, for the important background, which I think ties in to some potential underlying problem areas.
First, the immediate background. Battery is about 4 months old. Branded as an "EverStart" from Walmart, but made by East Penn Deka. Dead battery symptoms on this battery first appeared about a week ago, after we were absent on a month long trip. I didn't have it hooked to a charge maintainer, and forgot to disconnect the battery cable. At that point, the dead battery didn't surprise me.
To revive the battery, we used a very old charger that had a 50 amp start option. Got the vehicle home from where we parked while on vacation, then hooked it up to my own automatic "smart" battery charger. Seemed to work, until a couple of days ago, the battery died again.
So, thinking that it may be an alternator not charging, I tested with a multimeter.
Some additional relevant background: vehicle likely needs injectors cleaned, and is overdue for new spark plugs. This is relevant, as the ECU remapped itself to accommodate for this, however, every time the battery dies, it resets the ECU to factory, leading to poor idle until the ECU relearns. (I will address this issue separately, and this isn't directly part of the problem).
On to the multimeter results: after recharging enough to start with the external charger, I tested with the multimeter reading over 14 volts, while the vehicle did its initial elevated idle. When it dropped down to normal idle, which was rough, and barely at 400 rpm, due to the ECU being reset, the voltage reading was 12.5. With my son reading the multimeter, I manually bumped the RPMs to about 1000 with the accelerator, and the readings slowly crept up to near 14 volts. The results make me suspect the alternator isn't the culprit as initally thought. The ECU seemed to relearn quite quickly, so don't think it was a case of idle remaining too low after the boost, plus all the driving would have bumped the RPMs high enough for charging.
Now more background: connected to the battery are two more leads off positive, for the trailer wiring and brake controller added many years ago to the vehicle. Suspecting that there may be a very slight short in the aged wiring, I disconnected those to eliminate that issue, as I continued to monitor it over the next few days.
I also rigged the charger so that when it is at home, it is easy for my wife to plug it in to fully charge the battery, as the cord hangs from the front like a block heater cord would.
This morning, the vehicle didn't start again, same dead battery symptoms, but this time, it was plugged in to a charger (overnight), and should have been fully charged. All electrical load as off, as I ensured all accessories were turned off, and that the parking brake was on to prevent the daytime running lights coming on.
This leads me to believe that the 4 weeks sitting around has actually fried this battery.
But..., there is even more background, the entire battery history before this one:
I replaced the original battery in 2009. I suspected I had to because I had boneheadedly left the interior lights on too many times (manual switch on), and the latest time was just as temperatures dropped below freezing in the fall. Only open choice that evening with batteries was Walmart, and I had to get my wife up and running for the next morning. So off I went, and got their then branded "Energizer" made by Johnson Controls. Also that year, though I made no connection until recently as a possible cause, was all the trailer and brake controller wiring was installed that summer.
This battery lasted until around January 2012. Acid spewing everywhere, it gave up the ghost, but not before severly corroding the factory wiring leads. I had to replace the damaged section with very heavy gauge wire. Fighting Walmart on their warranty, they agreed to replace under warranty based on the manufacturer date sticker, and got a replacement, branded now as "EverStart" made by JCI.
But the battery woes weren't over. Again, the battery died in early 2014. While out of town this time, of course. The local Walmart there agreed to exchange under warranty. Another EverStart JCI.
And again, issues with that battery, with it being replaced again this March, with another EverStart, this time made by East Penn Deka.
Each time, the alternator tested okay with its output. A couple of times, with the different batteries over the years, there were some instances the battery died, but was successfully revived, while towing with the tent trailer, running the 12 volt fridge. Beefing up the trailer side wiring gauge, and avoiding running the 12 volt fridge seemed to elimate the issue, and so the trailer wiring wasn't suspect at that point.
The van was retired from towing after doing a final trip to take the tent trailer out to storage last fall (towing has been taken over by a different vehicle of mine).
Based on the evidence, I suspect that this is where I am now:
There is some sort of parasitic draw, probably a slight short in the trailer wiring.
Sitting 4 weeks without use completely fried this battery.
It only accepted charges for a short while, and even then, not very well, until now, it isn't accepting any charge at all.
Remedy is probably to replace this battery, but also completely disconnect the trailer wiring, to prevent this from occuring again.
Is this the right track, or am I completely missing something?