Hello, I stumbled upon this forum trying to find some information on a problem (well, one of many problems..) I'm having with my 2001 Alero (Approx. 135,000miles).
This is the original symptom:
When I try to start my car, the entire thing is dead. There's no power to anything. I tried to jump the car, but I couldn't get enough charge on the battery to get the car to start. The battery in the car looked like it may have been the original one, so I didn't think much of it when I went out to buy a new battery. Once I got the new battery, the car started right up. I shut off the car and went inside. A couple hours later, I came out to run an errand and the car was dead again. This time I was able to get it started with a jump.
So, from this I concluded that something was pulling excessive amperage while the car was off. I used an amp-meter to monitor current as I pulled each fuse under the hood and inside next to the driver's door. Before I started, approximately 600mA were being pull off the battery while the car was off. The only fuse that made any significant difference to this number was the L/H BEC BATT2 maxi fuse under the hood; after pulling it, current fell down to approximately 30mA. Without this fuse, I can't really do anything with the car (won't start, lights don't work, radio doesn't work, keyless entry doesn't work, etc.), but pulling it when I shut off the car does prevent the battery from draining.
I've been putting up with this problem for about a month now. I don't have much money or time as I'm trying to finish up college. I also don't know terribly much about cars, but i want to try and minimize costs before taking it in somewhere.
Has anyone seen a problem similar to this or have any recommendations on some simple things I can check? I know 600mA is quite a bit of current to be pulling off the battery when the car is off--but because so many things seem to rely on that L/H BEC BATT2 maxi fuse, I'm at a loss as to where to start.
Any help is much appreciated, thanks!
EDIT:
I forgot to mention that when I need to start the car, I just re-insert that maxi fuse. As long as I start the car right away, it seems to start normally and runs normally. Then, once I need to shut the car off for anymore than a minute or two, I pull the fuse to prevent the battery from draining.