Hello guys and gals,

Well I am new here and soon to be a new owner of a 85 xj6 tomorrow that I found really cheap so not going to pass it up. I have been reading the forums searching for an answer and have several but need to throw in something that was told to me today.

So the problem is the battery drains, go figure. The current owner and previous owner have always have just disconnected the ground from the battery. Well talking to the guy today because getting the car tomorrow, he drove it to made sure everything was working. He tells me when he goes to disconnect the battery it sounds like the blinker is clicking but the blinker isnt on. Well ive read plenty on here to go through the fuses, but have not read anything about people hearing the clicking sound.

Anyways Im not there to hear or try to find where the noise is coming from. But would love some ideas on where to start looking.

This will be my first Jag. I have restored about 3 cars all american all older than 67 so the electrics are as straight forward as they can get.

Great sight by the way glad I stumbled across it as it seems I might be spending alot of time here looking for adivice or ideas.

Thanks, Jeff

 

So what makes a noise like a "blinker" on a Series 3 XJ6 ? Well there are some funny little thermal overload cutouts on the window lift motor circuits, but these are only active when the ignition is on, and somebody tries to open/close a window, (or the switch is stuck). These thermal cutouts may be used elsewhere on the car when the ignition is off, but I don't know if this is the case or not.

All time favourite for battery drain on XJ6s is the trunk light as the switch can sometimes not be turned off by the trunk lid when it is closed.

I am assuming the ignition is off and there is still a battery drain, so on the wiring diagram anything with power to it when the ignition is off is a candidate for the problem.

Something sounding like the "blinker" is surely some sort of thermal overload cutout, not a relay, so check where these are.

 

Just an FYI on this. My son bought a 90 XJ6 base. We also have battery drain. found a blown fuse in passenger kick panel. It was a 25 amp in a 3 amp spot. Aslo had what looks like a sub wire coming off of it. Put a new 3 amp fuse in and what do you know, we also have the blinker click going on. It turns out that blinker click/flash is a way for the car to say something is still running/electrical. We noticed this when we left the dash light switch on in the center console. when we take out the 3 amp fuse, the blinker click/notification stops. Not sure what is shorting out so took out the fuse. we hope this stops the battery drain!

 

An ammeter or amp clamp, preferably, is the way to go. Put the clamp on the negative battery cable to observe the amount of draw on the battery. Then start finding and, one by one, pulling each and every fuse you can find in the car (and put them back before moving on to the next one. Most likely, the draw will suddenly go away when one of the fuses is pulled, isolating the drain to a particular circuit. Modern cars can draw up to .050 amps (50 milliamps) and that's considered normal, I would expect on these cars you'd want less than half that. If something's killing the battery in an overnight setting, however, you'll likely see a significantly higher draw, something like 500 milliamps or more. Obviously, if a relay or component is regularly clicking away just find the source of the clicking but barring that, the amp clamp is going to be your best bet.

Digital Clamp-On Ammeter- Craftsman-Tools-Electricians Tools & Lighting-Multi-Meters & Meters

Recently had the same problem on my 89 VW, every 2 or 3 days the battery would be dead. Hooked up the clamp, it was drawing 300 milliamps. Pulled each fuse until, of course, when I pulled the last fuse in the fuse panel it suddenly dropped to 20 milliamps. Fuse was for the interior lights and trunk light, trunk light switch was shorted. Took all of ten minutes to track down. Now it's easier on that car because, in rather un-English fashion, all the fuses are in one place and well documented. These cars, on the other hand, have all kinds of fuses hidden all kinds of places that you won't know about unless you've found them in previous travels, lol.