- Joined
- Dec 18, 2021
- Messages
- 13
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 1
- Location
- USA
- Vehicle Year
- 1997
- Make / Model
- Ford Ranger 4.0
- Transmission
- Automatic
Good Evening All,
New (to me!) ranger owner here, doing some DIY work to get everything running correctly. It's a 97 4.0 with about 245,000 miles and there has not been much done in terms of aftermarket parts aside from an updated radio. I recently changed out the fuel filter and returned to work on the truck two weeks later to find that the battery was not strong enough to initiate crank. An overnight trickle got the battery up to snuff, and then I did a parasitic draw test to find out where I'm losing juice. Turns out pulling the #8 20 amp maxi fuse under the hood removes the draw and the battery has been fine ever since. After doing a few other fixes I returned to attempt to fix the parasitic draw which is coming up as the parking lamp circuit. My first inclination was to look at the thing that I recently changed - the fuel filter. I removed the connection to it and replaced the fuse to see the same draw coming from the battery. It's approximately 170 mA, but when I remove the fuse it goes down to 20 mA. I also purchased new external light bulbs to see if any of them were creating an excessive draw, but swapping out all of them resulted in the same draw when the fuse is put back into place. The last thing I did was remove the electrical connector for a trailer that was connected to the rear driver side brake light. I reconnected the original wires that were spliced and removed the fuse that was spliced into the wires. None of this has removed the draw, so I am currently at a loss as to what it may be.
Anyone have a good idea on how to approach this electrical gremlin?
New (to me!) ranger owner here, doing some DIY work to get everything running correctly. It's a 97 4.0 with about 245,000 miles and there has not been much done in terms of aftermarket parts aside from an updated radio. I recently changed out the fuel filter and returned to work on the truck two weeks later to find that the battery was not strong enough to initiate crank. An overnight trickle got the battery up to snuff, and then I did a parasitic draw test to find out where I'm losing juice. Turns out pulling the #8 20 amp maxi fuse under the hood removes the draw and the battery has been fine ever since. After doing a few other fixes I returned to attempt to fix the parasitic draw which is coming up as the parking lamp circuit. My first inclination was to look at the thing that I recently changed - the fuel filter. I removed the connection to it and replaced the fuse to see the same draw coming from the battery. It's approximately 170 mA, but when I remove the fuse it goes down to 20 mA. I also purchased new external light bulbs to see if any of them were creating an excessive draw, but swapping out all of them resulted in the same draw when the fuse is put back into place. The last thing I did was remove the electrical connector for a trailer that was connected to the rear driver side brake light. I reconnected the original wires that were spliced and removed the fuse that was spliced into the wires. None of this has removed the draw, so I am currently at a loss as to what it may be.
Anyone have a good idea on how to approach this electrical gremlin?