2019 Ram Battery Issue

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NYEngineer

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One of my friends bought a new Ram pickup a few months ago. Crew cab, some kinda goofy cowboy motif in the interior. Nice truck though. Anyway, been fine until last weekend. He calls me up and says the battery is dead and it won't start. He had somewhere to go in his wife's car so I dropped off my jumper pack and said later, after it starts up, drive it over to my house and we can check the battery.
When he first got it started, he said it wouldn't shift out of first. He let it run a while and then shut it off and restarted it and it was fine. Yesterday, after work, he brought it to my house and I checked the condition of the battery. It was a 730cca battery and my tester said it had 836 amps. Battery was good. He spoke with Dodge too and they said bring it in. Who has time. He'll get it there if he NEEDS to.
Anyway, I remember last year, when my mom bought a new GMC Terrain and one morning, it was stone dead. Dealer towed it and gave her a loaner. They charged the battery and kept the car a week. Returned it and said nothing was wrong. They asked her where she parks it and where she keeps the keys. Turns out, the car and the keys were close enough to each other that it drained the battery. My mom moved the keys and it's never happened again. Has anyone else had this happen? Is this a thing now?
 
My boss has a 2018 ram and it did something similar to that.. The dealer ended up replacing some sort of electronic module. They initially replaced the battery, but that wasn't the issue.
 
Sounds like a TIPM (totally integrated power module) problem. Common problem with Fiats. He needs to take it in.
 
How did you determine that it was good for 836A? A conductance tester?

Maybe I missed it but did he actually properly charge it before bringing it to you?

Conductance testers are ok for charged, rested batteries in normal conditions. Ones with a surface charge, in underhood, hot conditions may get a skewed reading besides voltage.

Close key fob is plausible if being close turns on courtesy lights or other drains. I know we left one of our keyless fobs locked in our odyssey more than once, and once it's locked, it seems no worse for it. But we don't have many of the fancy things, and turn off the ones that we do. And, the fob on the exterior needs to be within just a few feet. I'm not sure that in another room/indoors, etc really can do it.

I'd be more inclined to think stuck relay or module not shutting down... or good old user error leaving a dome or glovebox light on. Seems no harm done to the battery, but you might want to properly load test it. Beyond that, unfortunately many of these fluke things are just that.
 
No Lojack.

JHZR2, I have one of those Midtronics testers. It has always been VERY accurate in telling me the condition of batteries. He drove the truck for a day after getting it started. It charged up with the alternator. I was actually surprised it didn't tell me to charge the battery.
And yeah, last night, he walked out to the truck in the dark with the fob and nothing happened. Doesn't seem like the fob thing is likely. It needs to go to the dealer.
 
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My 2007 Ram 1500 Laramie killed the battery if it sat more than a day. Tested and found that it had aconstant 200ma load and that was why. Iremoved all the fuses and the load was still there. Next I removed the reays and it was still there. After that, from previous experiences with carbonized bugs, I tapped the module sharply with the handle of my screwdriver and the load was gone . Problem has never returned.
 
The cluster may not be going to sleep, or uConnect may be trying to update and causing the same issue. Is this a Classic or the NBS? If NBS, does he have the huge uConnect screen or the 8.4"?
 
Thanks, Overkill. I'll tell him.

We work together and our schedule is pretty awful right now. Getting the truck to the dealer will be a minor hardship but he'll have to do it.
 
Like mentioned above, not sure if this is the "new" 2019 or a Classic 2019, but a co-worker of mine had this happen on his 2016 Ram 1500 4x4, crew, SLT, hemi, with the lower end smaller screen bluetooth/SiriusXM audio. He had been having weird glitches with the head unit and as it turned out, the head unit was staying powered on and killing the battery. New OEM head unit fixed it.
 
Hmmmm. Makes sense. We suspected it will probably end up going to the dealer. We just wanted to be sure it was not something he was doing that was preventable.
 
Originally Posted by JTK
Like mentioned above, not sure if this is the "new" 2019 or a Classic 2019, but a co-worker of mine had this happen on his 2016 Ram 1500 4x4, crew, SLT, hemi, with the lower end smaller screen bluetooth/SiriusXM audio. He had been having weird glitches with the head unit and as it turned out, the head unit was staying powered on and killing the battery. New OEM head unit fixed it.


Yup, just like with any computer, often software updates can be the fix. My '16 GC had a funky issue blamed on the amp, which was replaced when it was a demo and didn't solve the issue. A software update to UConnect fixed it which I flashed at home using a USB.
 
Originally Posted by NYEngineer
Hmmmm. Makes sense. We suspected it will probably end up going to the dealer. We just wanted to be sure it was not something he was doing that was preventable.


Best course of action. Everyone here is speculating.
 
OK... Figured it out. He called me and said something under the passenger seat was clicking every twenty seconds. I said see if the seat moves back and forth. It did not. I said try and unplug it. He did. Then he plugged it back in and the clicking stopped and the seat works. I said leave it unplugged so it doesnt kill the battery and it will start in the morning so you can make the 4:12 am train.

It will go to the dealer but at least now he can use it.
 
Originally Posted by NYEngineer
OK... Figured it out. He called me and said something under the passenger seat was clicking every twenty seconds. I said see if the seat moves back and forth. It did not. I said try and unplug it. He did. Then he plugged it back in and the clicking stopped and the seat works. I said leave it unplugged so it doesnt kill the battery and it will start in the morning so you can make the 4:12 am train.

It will go to the dealer but at least now he can use it.


Sounds like a simple fix!
thumbsup2.gif
Great to hear he figured it out and will have some clear direction for the dealer on what needs to be replaced.
 
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