Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting please help...bad battery or short/drain

hi all,the car-95 contour v6 5 speed 103,000 miles...the problem-every morning for the past 3 days the battery has been dead and i mean compleatly dead clock loses time and the radio loses its memory,as soon as i hook up jumper cables the light under the hood comes on and after 2 minutes i am able to start the car...ok now i let it run for a few moments turn it off and then it starts right up even after 2 hours but any longer and no juice no start,i should also tell you that the alt is new and the timer in the fuse box has been removed because the interior light will stay on and the dinging and donging wont stop...this problem started a month ago i assume it is a bad timer because i checked the door,hood,glovebox,and trunk switches...i would love to mod this car and take it to bristol dragway and smoke some rice,but i need to keep it running first.i knew this car would be trouble and was prepared for it (i used to own a thunderbird super coupe also full of problems)but i can use some help on this...thanx........................x-rated

take the battery to an auto zone and get them to check it..
probably has a bad cell... or not charged up all the way...

autozone very far at least 100 miles maybe advance can do it..will try in the morning..thanks

Back in January I started having a series of electrical problems...that I still have. So I know how you feel. Anyways, it seems people like to scream Dead Cell in the Battery a lot around here. It's possible but it was never my case. I know a leaky diode in your alternater can drain your battery even when the car is off. That was my first problem I had after replacing my bad alternater with one from a junk yard cuz I was poor at the time. There are other things like leaving something on, but I'm sure that isn't your case, because I would hope that you looked already. Also, if you have a bare wire (wiring on 95 is crap, I own one) that is touching metal somewhere, it can cause a drain.

Sorry to hijack, but here is my current problem..
The L-shaped metal pieces on the battery cables have ground wires and other stuff connected to them. My positive cable one snapped in half one day when I was connecting a new battery. Now I get stupid drain, and if I don't unhook the cable if it's gonna sit more than 10 hours, it goes dead.

Anyways...good luck.

thanks dredwingz03 advance says its the alt but i beg to differ because this is the 2nd new one from advance in 2 months and yes my wiring is bad in places and that is probally what it is...something is shorting and burning the alt up..also today i drove the car to advance as soon as i got there the car died and would not start back 30 minutes later with no jump start it fired right up but now all my gauges will not work no radio no lights and the tach is bouncing wildly...has anyone else had this problem???i believe its a short or a grounded wire...help me please!!!

you might want to check the mega fuse between the battery and the alt on the back side of the motor i had that problem

yea im going to do that in the morning...kinda ruling it out because it seems to work sometimes...alt under warranty but from advance and i dont really want to r&r it again but if i do im going to try and do it without removing the axel ...if i cant get it tomorrow im going to give the wife the x ,make this a track only contour ,and drive the caravan ...oh well i guess ...or maybe just part it out...

UPDATE...ok i took off the wheel,the inner fenders,the tie rod,got it off the ground high as i can and got under there and found the 3 or 4 wire connector to be unplugged clip must of fell off also they are bare for the most part...has anybody ever used liquid tape to recover bare wires on contique's?im going to try to redo all the bare wires i can find and reach i'll let you all know how it goes...it may be a cheap fix at $5.00 a can at advance...now my question is how do you remove the axel as i have not worked on this type before...thanks for all the help..keep it comming please

First, The electrical. If you can jump the battery, but two hours latter no start, I would load test the battery. You can have a fully charged battery, but if it won't hold a load you won't be able to start your car, and it will take longer than normal to jump it, so make sure to load test the battery(it must be fully charged before testing). With your new battery, or newly charged batt. you can check for a volt draw on the batt. by disconecting the poss. side of the batt. and holding your mulitimeter, to the cable and the batt post, it should read a draw.

It is possible to get defective alternators and batteries, off the shelf, that is why our shop uses a rebuild shop for the alts, and we only sell Interstate batt. in our shop(we have had little to no problems with them, and good warenty).

If you can find a Interstate distributer near by ask them for a "BLEM". They are less than perfect (by out side aperience only) and thay are almost half the cost in most applications.

For the Half-Shaft/Drive Axle, on front wheel drive vehicles, most are all the same.
1)Take the wheel/rotor off.
2)disconect the lower knuckle from the hub.
3)Remove the retaining nut located in the middle of the hub, retaining the out side spindle of the drive axle to the hub.
4)Once free pull the axle out, the inner spindle has a retaining clip on the spindle so it will stay in the transaxle, but it should pull out.

To install just reverse to procedure.

Good luck