So, I've been having a couple issues lately... and I don't know if they're all symptoms of an electrical problem, or one huge and unpleasant coincidence.

As mentioned before, my battery died while I was out of the country, nothing special (I don't think).

Then there was the whole funky instrument panel lights and steering issue the few minutes after I jump started it.

Last few days, my new head unit has been restarting itself. I thought it may have been overheating, but the way it cuts off is just like when I start the car (as you crank the engine, power is cut from the radio).

And today (as I was going to get some food), my driver side headlight (PnP H1 HIDs) came on for a split second and then refused to come on the couple times I flipped the lights on and off. Once I got to Burger King, I decided to mess with the lights again while I was waiting. I actually couldn't tell if the light was working again, because the area was a little too bright. A block or so down the road, I could see the telltale double light cutoff lines (meaning both sides were on).

So, is this all an electrical problem? Maybe the battery isn't "dead" but "damaged" and not putting out the right voltage/amperage?

I've been trying to think of possible solutions to that (if it is the case)... heftier battery, heftier alternator or something else? Maybe, if I get a trickle charger/maintainer, it can "repair" the battery somewhat.

To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if the battery fails, because I know that each time you start the engine, you should run it for some amount of time just to recover the charge used up in cranking the engine. But I do deliveries and think it's usually not enough time.

 

Hondas and Fit's in particular drop the alternator's generating field and rely just on battery power when idling and no large current loads exist. This is done to minimize parasitic loads.

An aging battery is probably dropping voltage too much at these times causing unpredictable behavior from voltage sensitive circuits (your HIDs and head).

Put a new battery in it. Put a test meter on it first if you're curious.

 

Its certainly possible that the battery is on its last legs. If you have one, sticking a charger on the battery might help. Similarly, autozone et al will run a battery test for you. If you are making lots of stop/starts, then the battery isn't going to be able to get a lot of charge built up after being dead. Plus its winter, which is harder on the battery. So charge it or get it tested and see what happens.

 

Depending on what your goals are.

If your first priority is reliability, I'd say just try a new battery and go from there.

If you want to save a few bucks and maybe save your existing battery, get a smartcharger that has a desulfator function to potentially restore your battery (e.g. batteryminder). Keep in mind that it may take days to weeks on the charger for the desulfating to have had an "effect" (if it could restore your battery at all).

 

I don't know if I'd classify the battery as old, since I've only had the car a year and half (build date was even just 5/10). But... *see below*

I have been wanting to buy a trickle charger/minder for a while, but haven't felt it was a priority since, aside from these two times, never actually had a battery die on me. I guess Amazon is about to get even more of my $$$ (I spend way too much on online shopping, especially at Amazon).

But at the same time, I do recognize everyone's thought that the battery could be just about done for. So, I'm pretty inclined on buying a new battery too. I'm not like my sister and her husband... if something is close to failing, I'm gonna swap it out, and not wait until it actually fails and completely dead (their "ah, it still works, sorta" attitude drives me nuts, when I'm the one that has to fix it!).

So... I guess my first step is to determine if the battery is still good (as in fine with a minder), or truly failing. Autozone, eh?

 

I would trickle charge it like you said and then do a load test. It basically sees if the battery can rebound after a load. If the volts dont go back up the battery is no good. Autozone should have the tester.

Batteries that run down sometimes dont recharge and since you do a lot of short trips with a lot of starting I think the battery is bad. The starter could be the next to go with the alternator.

 

I'd agree that the battery is possibly on it's last legs. Age is only one factor which will lead to a battery's death. How the vehicle is used will contribute a lot towards a premature failure of the battery. I've mentioned this elsewhere but on my 2000 GS-R, I had a 450W Amp driving all of the speakers (Which was not much for the stock battery to run) but to be on the "safe side", I added a .5 Farad capacitor (Lightning Cap) so that battery drain would be at a minimum. One thing I found that was a major benefit to adding the lightning cap was that the rest of the electrical system utilized the lightning cap as well. The Car started better in Cold weather, the lights didn't dim when the AC Compressor would kick in, and the stereo had enough power. I ran the Stock Battery until we traded the car in 2007. The Acura Dealer tested the battery in [iirc] 2003 and they said it was getting low and needed replacement. 4 years later, the car was still starting like a champ in sub-zero weather.

Not a Cure but an observation based upon my experience.

~SB

 

Well... that was a little unexpected.

At the moment, I'm sitting at Subway, having myself a sub. I was at an Advavce Auto Parts shop. I had them test my battery. Mind you, this was after a ten minute drive from my house also after a five to ten warm up period (while I was putting on my boots).

13.00V
367 CCA as tested
340 CCA rated.

WHAT?!? I finished my sub?!? Wait, I mean, my battery is "good"? If that's the case, and I'm still having these issues, then the headlight might really be a coincidence and the radio might be miswired. The only wire that I'm iffy about, is the parking brake check wire. It's a safety wire that locks out navigation control (along with a few other things) unless the parking brake is up. I did the bypass by simply grounding it out (wired to the ground wire in the harness).

I mean, I can sort of explain the battery dying while I was away, by the fact that the battery died when I was playing with the radio, without having the engine on. And that I didn't drive the car enough time to build up a sufficient charge before I left for my trip. Then again, maybe the car died the first time BECAUSE of a radio mis-wire drawing way more power, or flat out creating a short somewhere.

Crap, now I have do some troubleshooting.

 

Sorry to hear that, I would check the new parts you installed that run off power. Something is not wired right and is constantly pulling power. I hate electrical problems because its never a easy fix and even if you find where its at you always have another problem down the road from the damage from the first.

 

Well, my radio rebooted itself, gave me a chance to get a feel for how hot its running... pretty freaking hot. I think the wires in the back may be blocking the exhaust fan.

I decide to make a little more use of the UltraGauge I still had plugged in... put the battery voltage in one of the display gauges. It was reading between 14.20 and 14.50 volts with the engine on.

Now, to confirm whether it really is a heating issue or some random short. I opened up my side vents, but set the vent to output to windshield and leg vents.

 

I think 14.2 to 14.5 is a little high. That means its charging a dead battery or running over voltage. I would see how long it stays at that voltage. It should be around 13.6-13.8.

 

I don't jack around with anything that has to do with the electrical system and I use a battery charger as a maintenance procedure anytime I am in the barn and think about hooking it up. Other than setting up small tube type guitar amplifiers for use with a bullet microphone for playing blues harp I have a hard time with electrical systems.

 

I dont have the patients to go through the steps needed. I do understand the voltage and battery system. I had a suburban that had issues and read some where that it like going through 10 miles of wires. I gave up and never worked on electrical again.

 

After work, I went to Jewel to do some shopping. I watched the voltage display drop to nearly 11 V after shutting off the engine, but leaving the radio, headlights and fan+A/C running. Once I turned off those three, it climbed back up to roughly 12.5 before I decided leave the car and head into Jewel.

If I were going to go through the wiring, I actually wouldn't bother going through the whole thing... just the parts I came into contact with installing the HID and HU. Even then, if the HID was wired wrong, it would never light up (there's only two wires!) because I'm pretty sure the ballast only works one way. And I'm also fairly certain that the wiring for the radio is correct.

 

Maybe it is the PNP kit causing the issues. Is the kit one of those cheap HID setups? Or is it some OEM kit retro-fitted into the Fit headlamp housing?

First thing I thought when I read your opening post was your HID kit was causing problems.

 

that is possible, it puts out a fairly strong EM field that pretty much knocks out FM reception (maybe AM too). So, I wouldn't put it past it to be drawing more than it should when its on.

But because it runs directly off the OE wiring and not a relayed power cable from battery, it draws no power when its off, so there's no drain when the lights are off. And my lights were off when I was messing with the new HU when my battery first died.

Just because I was fed up with kits from Amazon's 3rd party sellers (never sure about quality), I decided to order a set from "The Retrofit Source." Since they are supposedly better quality parts. But, it's still basically a PnP kit, just not an H4 kit because I have dual H1 projector housings (projectors for low anyway). And this one WILL have a relayed power cable coming from the battery, which means it actually has potential to draw power from the battery even with my lights switched off.

When watching the battery voltage, engine load % and RPM@idle, there's no noticeable effect unless BOTH my lights AND the A/C is on. If it's just one or the other, it's not noticeable in the display numbers.

On a related note, I have been wondering if the wiring for the dual H1s is incorrect. I did a similar single to dual swap in the Mirage I had (H4 to H1+H3). But the wires came swapped around causing the wrong bulb to light up (high was triggered in low setting). I replaced a melted H4 connector in the Pathfinder, and temporarily miswired it, resulting in a dim low beam.

That being said, the right bulbs are lighting up and the low beam in the Fit appears fine, if anything the high beam *might* be dim. but you can't really compare the output of a high halogen to a low HID and when both were halogen, the intensity was mostly the same, just differing patterns. But if that's the case, it really wouldn't matter, since all it means is the low beam wire and ground are reversed (the HID shouldn't be working at all, again, because I would think that it's a one-way only circuit). And I'm rarely, if ever using my high beams.

I'm slowly moving back to the "it's a massively annoying coincidence" idea. :S

That the initial dead battery was result of just me playing with the HU while the engine was off. The second time the battery died was because it hadn't fully recharged and it got colder. The head light failing due to low quality parts. And finally, the radio rebooting because it's overheating.

But I am still curious about SB's comment about my voltage being too high with engine on... can anyone else check their voltage through UG?

 

The only thing I can recommend currently would be sure to check the battery terminal connections for tightness and corrosion and possibly double check the ultra-gague numbers with a voltmeter at the battery terminals.

 

All the while playing (or having a helper) play with the lights and radio.

I can't imagine a car radio overheating. That would pretty much limit its use to 3 seasons and covered parking.

What are the specs for the radio and lights? Do they list peak current and voltage operating ranges? Does the radio list ambient temperature limits?

 

It doesn't give specific numbers but does warn about "extreme ambient temps." It has an exhaust fan in the back (to cool it off), right where all the wires from harness are sitting. Which I think is hampering airflow.

Got this off of Kenwood's site
Those dimensions don't leave a lot of room in the back of the HU. I had to fidget with the wires back there just to get it in.

Amazon.com: KENSUN HID Xenon Conversion Kit Digital Slim Ballast H1 8000k (Thunder Blue): Automotive is the HID, according to it, it uses 20 amps on start, 3 for continuous. There's mention that it might be 35 watts.

I don't have a voltmeter to confirm UG's stats.

 

3 Amps * 12 volts is 36 watts. That's where that number came from.

Stock HB2s use 55/65 watts each, so that's healthy after startup.

But 20 amps at startup is high (is that per light?). It might be the headlight circuit isn't isolated enough from the radio causing a voltage drop, however momentary, enough for it to stop working. Is there any correlation between turning on the lights and the radio burping?

The Fit's headlight fuses are all 10amps. The startup draw of the HIDs is probably so fast that it won't burn those out, but enough to cause a low voltage spike.

I'd be looking at installing relays for the HIDs and powering the relays from the stock headlight circuit. The HID headlight circuit could then be directly to the battery (with its own fuse).

What would be interesting is testing the radio voltage at the fuse block over a variety of operating scenarios. The stock radio circuit has a 30 amp fuse on it, so the 15amp max rating for the new radio isn't out of line. 60C is 140F so the operating range is probably not an issue.

edit edit: not fully understanding how the load detection works on Hondas, wiring the headlight load directly to the battery might result in draining the battery. If the car doesn't detect the load, it may not meet it at the alternator. It's not simple voltage regulation. shrug.