I have had trouble with a parasitic drain, although I had solved it for a while, or so I thought. For at least several months it did not plague me, but it has been back for the last couple of months. I have been working in the vicinity of this unknown component, and had gone through, at one point, and made sure all the fuses and relays in all the boxes throughout the car were firmly seated, finding several that were not, about the time my drain returned.

After pulling off rolls of black Gorilla Tape, leaving a disgusting sticky residue behind on everything, I have found a component that had been concealed by all the tape. This mystery 'box' sits underneath the pump and amp rack, from left to right pic-1&2.

It has been spliced into the large gauge red cable coming from the trunk electrical carrier, pic-3, with electrical tape.

It connects to some kind of antenna with writing that states: 'Antenna America Inc.,' and some patent and other numbers, pic-4, that was taped up underneath the rear quarter panel above the hydraulic pump.

Is this a remnant of some type of aftermarket equipment previously installed on my car, and only partially removed when sold, that I may have somehow re-activated when I re-seated my fuses and Relays? Could this small box, pic-5&6, be causing my parasitic drain, and if it is, do I just cut it loose?

Oh, and the hanging wire harness, obviously too difficult to re-attach to the brackets right next to it, is just another example of the crap work that was done by the dealership. In this example, an antenna motor had been replaced, and the passenger brake light assembly was replaced, and the wiring mess is the result; but this is the stuff that keeps me busy.

Thanks in Advance,
'03 XKR

 

GPS tracker maybe?

And yes it might be the problem.

 

Great! Just what my paranoid nature needs. I have been tracked before; I can say first hand that it is not fun, rather creepy, and quite infuriating actually, and can bring one to the breaking point rather quickly. I am lucky for the fact that other people working at the store began noticing as well, without me telling them any of my concerns about being followed. A store associate actually commented to me, when I came in one day saying, 'I have never seen those two people in this store before, but every time you come in, they are not far behind, they never buy anything, and leave right after you do.'

 

maybe it.. could be some sort of cell phone aftermarket add on? That's really odd.. or like he said to track a jealous lover via some aftermarket GPS or.. some old old satelite radio add on.... *shrugs* that's weird. Hope that fixes your battery drain :S

 

I was thinking it may be some sort of component from an aftermarket satellite radio, or other type of audio conversion, and that this box is all that remains of the installation. I have had the dash instrument panel, and lower kick panel off, and other than a rat's nest of wiring shoved up under, just long enough to get the kick panel back on, which I straitened out and clipped back to their mounting brackets, there is no other wiring or anything present to suggest anything was ever there to begin with.

I was a bit concerned that it was an original component, crappily relocated and spliced into a hot cable, after viewing post pictures of people that had bought an X100, and found horrid installations and wiring bypasses for upgraded LED brake lights, and thought I may have stumbled across something like this due to the battery drain. I did not want to sever contact with any electrical component connected to the car without a bit of information and input beforehand. But after finding the antenna taped up under the inner rear wing, and showing the pictures to a buddy of mine, who said that aftermarket Satellite Radio Antenna's are usually mounted as close to the original car's antenna as possible, it made sense that it was more than likely a remnant of a previous installation as the antenna strip I removed could not be any closer to the car's antenna. I am going out to unscrew the 'box' and inspect it further for identifying information now that the Sun is up and will report back what I find.

 

This is what I have found out about the 'box' under the Amp Rack. I took the following pictures, and recorded the information off of the box which led me to this description: 'IMETRIK LOCATE S VEHICLE GPS TRACKING DEVICE RECOVERY SYSTEM FCC IDILJU-03U', by LOJAK. Searching around the web, I found that it was OEM on the Jaguar X-Type one year and on a VW, and others. It's most common application, if not installed by the owner to utilize it's capabilities, is to harrass the sh*t out of a person buying a car from less than reputable Dealers, who will use it against you if you miss a payment. Apparently, it has the ability to not only broadcast the location of the car constantly, but can also immobilize the vehicle with a keystroke, and provides friendly vocal reminders that their payment is due or overdue.

I thought it had been spliced into the red 12V lead coming from the trunk's fuse box, however, after I removed the screws this afternoon, in between rainstorms, I found that under the tape, the cable's insulation had a square chunk cut out, and the wire was taped to the inner wire through this cutout. I had my meter hooked up to the battery to see what, if anything would happen, as the wire fell off the cable when I pulled the box out. There were three wires, but only the red and black were used, the blue was tied back amongst the mess of electrical tape.

My battery had already been drawn down by the time I went out to do this, so I do not have a baseline as of removal, but the battery had been dropping 1/2 of a volt over several hours.

Thanks

 

wow! GPS tracker.. yeah someone wanted to keep track of someone.. :/ I used to have a Miata with a really nice car alarm.. red flashing led on the dashboard and it would immobilize the engine and automatically arm the car after 20 seconds of non-use.. it was really nice..

Problem was it would draw the battery down (which was a gel type battery) and if I didn't drive the car for let's say 4 days it would be flat on a good new battery..

So yeah I would yank that thing out asap. Glad you found it :/ least one positive if you did find out how to use that immobilizer you could leave it in and if your car gets stolen you can track it or shut the engine down... but yeah if you don't know how to access that then.. yeah I'd take that out asap. Good job figuring that out!

 

Already did; that is what I think this unit has been doing, at least I hope. The info online says it has a battery pack capable of powering it for 30 days if the battery is disconnected from the car, and it is supposed to be spliced into an ignition switched lead, not on the main line. This would be to aide in locating a stolen vehicle. Some have, and mine may have had additional components hooked up to the ignition wiring as well.

This unit is old, old as in 2003 era, back when the car was new, and there were undoubtedly valid financial concerns and they would not want the car just disappearing. I read about the battery pack eventually failing, and causing problems with cars from Ferrari to VW. These owners had no idea these devices were even installed, and spent time and money trying to diagnose charging and ignition system issues, with some eventually selling their vehicles because they could not fix them, with only a few finding the 'box' like I did, as they were hidden extremely well. It was never disclosed to the latter owners that the tracking devices were still on the car, and once the battery pack dies the problems start.

I just put a new AGM battery from AutoZone in the car, and it is claimed to be designed for heavy car electronic usage after the car is off, and it is the best battery I have ever bought. Especially when dealing with this drain, if the battery voltage drops, I can start the car and literally drive it around the block and it is charged back up to 12.99/13.00 VDC.

 

Why...are you in some kind of witness protection program?

 

I could tell you, but then....

 

Isn't it far more likely that the tracker was installed so that the owner could find their car in the event of a theft, rather than it was put there by some mysterious organisation that wanted to track the car or owner secretly.
I sense a lot of paranoia in this thread!

 

It can be installed by an owner, but according to the post's I read it is also installed by 'we finance everyone', and re-possess on the first missed payment, auto dealers that use it to find the car. The problem is that they buy the units used and near or at the end of the built in battery packs life span, and when it goes, they start causing problems. The other problem was the same with the battery packs they are worn out now, but the units were installed when the car was new by the dealer/bank who sold the car originally, these cars were spendy once, to keep track of the investment. But they never told anyone down the line that they are installed and the batteries are now failing and causing problems because no one remembers or knows that they are there. I came across mine purely by accident, and it was hidden quite well.

 

I wasn't disputing that it was the cause of your problem, only that there seemed to be a lot a paranoia in the thread!

 

Oh, that, I was followed around once, and it was creepy, but that was the State confirming that the Doctor that performed my surgeries actually did destroy my knees real good in the process. It kinda turned into a joke.

 

Ive installed those on high end cars that are susceptible to theft. very common they were the first people that made tracking a stolen car, recoverable.Now the first thing the theft does after he has your car in a trailer is to look for these and you can see yours was not very well hidden. You can call them and let them know you own the car and maybe they will change it over to you if you want or just remove it entirely and solve your drain problem.
Randy

 

I have already removed the Tracker and hopefully this will solve my drain.

As far as paranoia, take a look at the tracking site's webpage, it looks like it was designed by Big Brother. link here: GPSentinel Real Time GPS tracking units » GPSentinel


And here is their 'Mission Statement'? copied from their webpage.

"Dealerships and delinquency management businesses. iMetrik 3.5G GPS Tracking units in Real-Time designed for "Buy here pay here dealers", "finance companies", "Rental companies".

Our quality iMetrik real-time 3.5G GPS Tracking units offer a powerful asset for tracking your investment enabling you to monitor and track your vehicle with real-time maps at any time of the day or night. Our solution is a complete credit-risk management system giving you a piece of mind for today and a return on your investment (ROI). Auto finance companies are recognizing the benefits of using our delinquency management solutions, especially in a complicated credit environment: Our solutions allow these companies to diminish their risk."-sic

Here’s Why.

*Reduces skips
*Decreases repossessions
*Cuts delinquencies
*Boosts on-time payment
*Intuitive web-based user interface.
*Fantastic asset management functions: search vehicles, create vehicle groups, location history to name a few.
*Remote functions: locate vehicle, starter interrupt, warning alarms.
*Schedules.
*Advanced Mapping and more...

If I am able to get the User Name, and Password for the system, and can change them, I would consider hooking it up correctly and hiding it properly. The tracking function, as long as it were under my control, and the ability to immobilize the vehicle from a smart phone could come in handy. However, if I were receiving payment reminders through my car stereo speakers, whether or not I am listening to the radio, would drive me crazy, and anger me beyond belief.

 

When I saw the antenna, my first thought was "Lojack".


This was a popular vehicle theft locator 15 years ago.

 

+1 on LoJack . Here in San Diego it only takes 20 minutes from the time your car is stolen until it's in Mexico. It can be disables and tracked if you call them immediately after it is stolen. I've had it installed on several cars. The idea is that when they install it they hide it so the savvy thief can't disable it.