chuffsy

My son is out of town and the battery in his 2010 civic died suddenly. There was a four hour downtime before he attempted to start it without success , the starter made the click , click , click sound. A friend gave him a jump and he had it idling for 15 mins or so , shut it off then restarted it. Starting was not as brisk as before. I'm trying to figure whether it's an alternator or battery problem. So my question is , if indeed the alternator/ charging was not working would there be a light on the instrument cluster to indicate that? Perhaps a battery symbol or the word "charge" something to that effect? Oh by the way , the battery is one year old. The car is in central Florida.

ezone

Too vague, can't diag from here. Need more info, maybe some scenario that led up to this event.


If the kid left lights on when he exited the car, that could drain a battery.

If the kid left the key in the 'run' position while listening to the radio or charging up the cell phone, that can drain a battery pretty quick, sometimes only 5-10 minutes depending on battery condition. (this happens A LOT)

In either of those cases a jump start and some run time to recharge the drained battery is all it needs.
Problem will not reoccur if there is no electrical drain and the battery is still ok..

If the weak battery issue persists tomorrow, then it's a problem and needs some checking.
Compressor clutch relay (stuck on) is one common possible cause of a battery drained overnight.

Send kid to local Autozone or similar for free battery and starter/alternator check?

chuffsy

So, it had a weak start after the charge from idling for 15minutes or so . That was last night. Today the battery was dead again. So here is what I am thinking. A year ago I replaced the magnetic clutch relay (Omron) with the new updated one......well...so I thought. In attempt to diagnose whats draining the battery I instructed my son to remove the "mag clutch relay" (i have learnt that this could be one possible reason ) and give the car a jump , let it idle and charge the battery and see what gives.Well the car would not start with a jump...not until he replaced the relay ( the one I thought was the mag clutch relay. So did I swap out the wrong relay? We faced time each other and looked at the fuse/relay box and its cover. It seems , and please correct me here , anyone, that the mag clutch relay ,as represented by the "snow flake " symbol is the relay that when facing the car is in front of the green relays. I instructed my son to remove that relay and reinstall the known good Omron that I had removed during the swap. So now we are waiting for a jump from a friend of his to repeat the battery charge and start sequence again and see what happens. The new updated relay that I had installed (brown in color , Mitsuba brand is still installed to the left the front green relay. Thats the position I thought was for the mag clutch .I will post back.

ezone

15 minutes may not have been enough charge time to bring the battery up to a full charge, but it does seem that if it went completely dead overnight there would be something in the car draining it.

The battery could be bad, they can self-discharge. Age means little, battery life can be hit or miss. Oh, the little electronic gizmos that "test" the battery in like 5 seconds cannot detect all the different ways a battery can fail. I've had batteries pass on that tester but can't start the car 5 minutes later.



Not starting while jumper cables were attached was probably due to poor connection(s) with the cables OR not waiting long enough for the battery to gain a bit of charge before trying to crank it, those are very common.

Even if the clutch relay had been stuck on at the time, that alone would not inhibit starter operation. The compressor clutch only draws maybe a couple amps, certainly much less than the 100+ amps of a starter motor.


If you look at the lid of the box, there is more than one relay labeled with a snowflake. The condenser fan relay is also labeled with a snowflake IIRC. I rarely use those diagrams though.

I posted a diagram of the underhood relays in your old thread and noted which relay operates the AC clutch, in post #2

https://www.civicforums.com/forums/1...ay-2010-a.html


Send that diagram to Junior along with noting exactly which relay to pull out?

chuffsy

Ezone , thanks for the follow up. I have instructed my son to get a jump and go driving , ultimately to autozone or advanced auto. There he can have the system checked and see what gives. I will post back and thanks for the look back on the thread referencing the relay and fuse ident.

ezone

Keep in mind they will not figure out if there is a drain on the battery.

chuffsy

Yeah , understand.
Thanks

chuffsy

So , my son went to Advanced auto and the battery measured 9v , this after driving around for a while. They wanted to charge the battery which would take a couple hours , so they could test it. Time is of the essence so we elected to have a new battery put in. We kept the old battery so we could return it (costco). I had my son check the operation of the magnetic clutch which seems to be working normally. If indeed there is something else draining the battery we will find out tomorrow morning. I will post back.

ezone

Did they make sure the alternator is working correctly too?
If so, that sounds like the battery was at fault.

chuffsy

Ezone,
Not sure if they did , forgot to ask my son . Also the first time he got a jump he ran the car for over 15 minutes after which he was able to get a start. I'm thinking that perhaps the system is charging which leads me to ask if indeed it was not charging would there be a light of sorts on the instrument panel, perhaps the word "charge" or a battery symbol?

ezone

Yes I bet it is charging at least enough to keep the car running, but a good charging system test would be in order just to be sure.

charging system warning light would be the red battery symbol, and not all alternator failures turn that warning light on.

chuffsy

OK will follow up on that . Thanks for your help.

chuffsy

The car not being driven since yesterday since the new battery was installed started up briskly this morning. If it stays like this for the next couple days I take it that it was just a bad battery.

chuffsy

Update:
Its been a few days now and all seems well. Just a bad battery it seems (Interstate brand)