Battery Drain Problem

68582 Views 27 Replies 22 Participants Last post by npolite, Nov 7, 2021

kinnyboi1

Discussion Starter · Oct 16, 2012 (Edited by Moderator)

Good evening, I have a 2006 acura tsx. I am having a parasitic drain problem.

So here's the story. I would wake up every morning and my car is dead. I took it to an auto shop and they checked the battery and the alternator, both are good. So I look online how to see what is draining it, I got my multimeter, and it is reading 0.50Amp thats equal to 500Ma, and the reasonable amperage should be reading 0.02 amp or 20ma - 50ma. I start pulling the fuses and found out fuse #6 and #7 in the interior fuse box is causing the problem, after I pull out fuse #6 "interior light" and fuse #7 "back up fuse" the amperage draw drops to 0.08 amp.

Does anybody have the same issue that I had? I have brought it to many places and they can't find the problem. Thanks.

1 - 20 of 28 Posts

cheezthis

· #2 · Oct 17, 2012

Anything aftermarket installed or recently changed/replaced?

I do recall when working at Acura years ago some random devices actually going bad and draining the battery slowly while the car was off. Such items included XM brains and similar.

kinnyboi1

Discussion Starter · #3 · Nov 6, 2012

I had a aftermarket alarm installed, thats basically it, but the alarm is not the problem, cuz i uninstalled it and it still does the same thing.

sj993

· #4 · Nov 8, 2012

You might check the HFL (Hands Free Link) unit. You can try unplugging it and then check the draw. I've seen a few 3G TL's with this problem where the unit goes bad and as a result has a constant parasitic draw.

olegus

· #5 · Mar 16, 2013

Sorry to bump the old thread, but I had exactly the same leak through fuses 6 and 7 in 2008 TSX. The combine leak is about 900 mA, ~700 through fuse #6 and ~200 through #7.
When I measure current with my ammeter I hear strange sound from CD changer area as it tries to load/unload disks.
Any idea what can it be?
Also, how can I turn off HFL ? Looks like it does not have dedicated fuse.

olegus

· #6 · Mar 16, 2013

Following up...
After about 30 sec drain goes down to 200mA and stays there. Looks like I found a culprit for the fuse 7 - it was my backup camera from eBay - I suspect it is because I tapped it to a wrong wire.
So the main suspect is HFL for now. Trying to find where is it in 2008. Found a picture that shows HFL in 2004 located under console cover near of parking brake, will look there first.
To be continued...

olegus

· #7 · Mar 16, 2013

Continue...
I tried to locate HFL to turn it off and surprisingly could not find it. I checked three places that were mentioned in different sources:
- under the central console cover near of parking break, how was shown in 2004 TSX service manual I found on the net.
- behind the kick panel on the passenger side as it was suggested here http://**************.com/forums/showthread.php?t=835325
- behind reader lights/homelink console as it is in TL

It is really frustrating, but the only way to figure it out is going to a dealer, I guess.

olegus

· #8 · Mar 17, 2013

Finally...Gotcha!
It is indeed located on the passenger side behind the side panel! In order to get to it first you need to pry off floor sill trim, and then the kick panel. It's enough just to undo bottom clips and you have enough room to get in and pull a plug from HFL unit.
Needless to say when I did that, my stand by draw immediately get back to normal - ~0.020A. HFL sucks 200mA (0.2A) no matter what.
Now THE question - what can be wrong with it? Bad capacitor or smth I can easy replace or I need a new unit?
Two pictures showing HFL location. Sorry for bad quality.

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ivanich_2002

· #9 · Sep 28, 2013

Hello. I have the same problem with HFL. How did you solve this problem finaly. Thank's.

amy_alley1

· #10 · Apr 25, 2014

Thanks for the pics. I'm going to try this tonight!

Amy

bergi85

· #11 · Jan 30, 2015

Okay so, I had the same issue and decided to try this out as well. Here are some more pictures of where the HFL unit is located. As mentioned before, it is in the passenger footwell (kick panel). It is the black box with the green connector. Hope that helps someone.

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Bre1er

· #12 · Aug 6, 2016

I am having the exact same problem with my 2012 TSX, unfortunately the HFL is not located on the passenger side panel, as it is in earlier models, I checked. Anyone happen to know where it is in the 2012 models? I searched and searched online and nothing. Thanks!

Jottle

· #13 · Aug 24, 2016

FYI some owners are pulling together a class action suit over this issue: https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit...ss-action-alleges-bluetooth-drains-batteries/

Zephrem

· #14 · Aug 28, 2016

A quick thanks to the posters in this thread. 2006 TSX. My HFL worked fine but repeated battery drain led to discovery of the HFL parasitic draw. Replaced the HFL unit with one from a salvaged TSX with help from this thread. Works well. 20 minute swap out with a 10MM socket wrench, and most of that was trying to be careful not to scratch or break the clips in the kick panel. I hope Acura will be prompted to design a replacement HFL unit soon.

PsybinZek

· #15 · May 19, 2017

I'm suspecting a draw myself, if the car sits for more than two days it has a dead battery.
I am going to do some poking around tonight and see if I can narrow it down.

Edit: I narrowed down the parasitic draw to the hands free module using a multimeter. It's now unplugged, I never used it anyway. Pretty lame Acura never stepped up on this to let owners know, even though they are very aware of it. I called a dealer just to see if there was any sort of open recalls regarding it and even though they see it on a regular basis Acura hasn't really "addressed" it.

primula

· #16 · Jan 8, 2018

My battery died after coming back from long vacation + cold weather.

I decided to do a parasitic draw test and found the car draining at 0.2A after ~30s.

Disconnected the HFL module, and did a battery upgrade, hopefully no winter downtime.
HFL has been working fine, but I rarely used it, so I decided to just disconnect it.

To get to the module, I removed the kickpanel under the gloved box, the door deal panel.

mechanic408

· #17 · Jan 9, 2018

disconnect the HONDA HAND FREE ITS KNOWN TO BE A PARISTIC DRAW ITEM. its located passenger side kick panel

KahSoSuave

· #18 · Jan 31, 2018

mechanic408 said:
disconnect the HONDA HAND FREE ITS KNOWN TO BE A PARISTIC DRAW ITEM. its located passenger side kick panel

How can I be sure that this is the culprit? I want to do a test on this to make sure this is the conflict. How would I go about doing a test on this? FYI ... I only really have issues when its really cold , so i could have the car sitting for 3 days without starting and it starts fine in normal weather.... would this still be considered a parasitic draw? thinking more of a CCA?

Sahilah123

· #19 · Jan 31, 2018

KahSoSuave said:
How can I be sure that this is the culprit? I want to do a test on this to make sure this is the conflict. How would I go about doing a test on this? FYI ... I only really have issues when its really cold , so i could have the car sitting for 3 days without starting and it starts fine in normal weather.... would this still be considered a parasitic draw? thinking more of a CCA?

When you take off the passenger kick panel, and the car has been off for some time, if it is bad and drawing power it will be hot to the touch. thats what happened to mine. now its just permanently disconnected

Reactions: 1

primula

· #20 · Feb 1, 2018

KahSoSuave said:
How can I be sure that this is the culprit? I want to do a test on this to make sure this is the conflict. How would I go about doing a test on this? FYI ... I only really have issues when its really cold , so i could have the car sitting for 3 days without starting and it starts fine in normal weather.... would this still be considered a parasitic draw? thinking more of a CCA?

I do have issues when it is cold. I don't think more CCA will help you long term. Google online on how people do parasitic draw test.

What I did was made sure there's nothing that will drain the battery (lights, dashcam, etc) are disconnected. Make sure doors are closed too.

Disconnect the negative terminal of the battery, and run a multimeter in-series / in-line. Initially it will be ~1A and drop after a while. after maybe 20 seconds, it was alternating between 0.2A (200mA) and 0mA. I disconnected the bluetooth module and redid the test again. It was alternating between 20mA and 0mA.

Sahilah123 said:
When you take off the passenger kick panel, and the car has been off for some time, if it is bad and drawing power it will be hot to the touch. thats what happened to mine. now its just permanently disconnected

I don't recall mine being hot, but i may have disconnected the battery long enough for it to cool down.

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