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SUVs Honda Pilot Honda Pilot Maintenance and Repair
3189 messages, Last post on Dec 02, 2009 at 3:25 AM
You are in the Honda Pilot Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & tidester
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This is a replica of my post that I put into wrong place originally. Just want to share some helpful information I didn’t find anywhere. I measured current drawing from the battery when car is parked. In my case it was new 2009 EX Pilot, 2WD, 1800 miles on the odometer. The data taken would also be useful for the future; if possible problems with the battery rose. Test1. The ignition switch is in LOCK (0) position, the key is in the ignition switch – 156mA Test2. The ignition switch is in LOCK (0) position, the key is removed – 45mA What does it mean for the owner? If you leave your car in the garage with the key in the ignition switch (which most of us do), the 100% charged 60Ah battery will lost 80% of its capacity within 13 days (or within 45 days without the key). That was theoretical calculation. In addition to that, flooded lead-acid batteries have relatively high self-discharge rate even without any external circuits. It could be 8-40% per month (2-10% per week) depends on how old the battery is. One note for those, who will replicate this test on your car. Right after connecting MM, the current jumps up to 2-3 Amps, then gradually gets down within 10-15 seconds. So, set your MM properly or it could be damaged. |
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Replying to: eteled (May 03, 2009 11:54 am) On test 2, any idea of what would be causing a 45 mA draw? That still seems really high. As for the 8-40% self discharge per month, that too is a very high figure. That number is typical of a NiCd or NiMH (or maybe a deep-cycle type marine battery that should be kept on a trickle charger). A sealed lead acid battery should only loose around 5% of it's charge per month, or less if it is well made. |
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Replying to: eteled (May 03, 2009 11:54 am) YES YES YES, I finally understood the battery discharge cause ! justaveragejoe you are right, the high current is caused by the lights in the dash being ON, and "other things". This is not important because those lights will go OFF by themselves after a minute or so. eteled, about the 45 mA you measure, that is caused by at least one door being open. The current drawn is function of how many doors you keep open. I think bigdady suggested that longtime ago, and he was right. Probably the security system is responsible for this current waste. So, I measured the following (with anything in the car shutdown, and with the bulbs at the bottom of the front doors removed - I always removed those door bulbs on all my cars): _ all doors closed: 21-29mA (it's switching between these values for some reason) _ one door open: 59-65mA _ two doors open: 65-71mA _ three doors open: 71-77mA _ four doors open: 79-83mA _ all 5 doors open: 84-87mA _ four doors open, with the lights in the dash ON: 200-207mA. My 2008 model has these lights. I am not sure if your 2009 model has this stupid "always lighted" kind of speedometer dash. I hope you don't have them because it's the unsafest option I ever saw installed on a car (I forget to turn ON the headlights at night time, because I see light in the dash all the time). What can be unsafer than driving without lights ?!?! eteled, it was funny to read your last paragraph ! Me too I burned my multimeter fuse during these measurements. I am happy the multimeter survived though ! The initial current is huge (very visible spark when you connect the ampermeter in series between the battery terminal and the cable). This could burn a delicate multimeter. The safe way I found for doing this measurement is "4 hands". Use the negative battery connection, not the positive one (the User Guide says that). So have your wife keep the negative cable touching the battery's negative terminal. Then use your hands to connect the ampermeter (the initial current will be zero because all the current will go directly from the battery terminal to the negative cable). Then tell your wife to disconnect the cable from the terminal. Now the current flows through the ampermeter (without any dangerous spike), so you can read it. Using some clamps could substitute the wife, and would also lower the probability of divorce !!! Cheers
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Replying to: rodut (May 16, 2009 3:44 pm) Agreed. Ammeters are hard to read when the current spikes and fries it to a crisp.  tidester, host SUVs and Smart Shopper |
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I have 2008 Pilot VP AWD and the car is 1 year old with 13K mi.. Lately I have message of the "Check Fuel Cap" blinking at the window of Maintenance Minder. The message goes away if I press the little stick to choose Trip-A, Trip-B, Oil Life%. I am sure the fuel cap is tight as I used to click it 4-5 times so really have no clue what's wrong. Does anyone experience this thing? Car is under warranty and I will mention to dealer when I take it to dealer as the maintenance is due.
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Replying to: bigdadi118 (May 26, 2009 1:37 pm) Do you leave the car running for any reason when re-fueling? Definitely tell the dealer about the problem, so it will be documented. Hopefully they can find an error code on the computer. |
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Replying to: rodut (May 16, 2009 3:44 pm) |
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If you have any suggestions, let me know! Catastropic engine failure in a 4 year-old Honda Pilot with 47,000miles???!!!! Yes, that's correct. Driving the car normally one minute, and completely overheated and shut-down the next. Had to be towed to the dealership where they've had it for 3 days and STILL cannot figure out exactly what's wrong. It's bad. Very, very bad. And to add icing to this wonderful confection, the '05 has a 3/36,000 mile warrarty, whereas the '06 has a 4/48,000 (meaning it would be covered no questions). The car has had no issues before this. No leaking fluid, no weird noises or grinding--nothing. They've sent it out to be "magnifluxed" to see if there are any other cracks in the engine. Mind you, the engine is torn apart. If it's ONLY the head gasket (which it's not), the cost will be $1550. For a 4 year-old Honda. They've said that they've never seen this happen before. I like to be different, but not THAT different! I've already contacted Honda Motors America, who said they can't do anything until a diagnosis of the problem is made. I have a case number, but that's it. AND....now I'm paying for a crappy rental for at least a week! DH has been diligent about all maintence--he does the oil changes with genuine honda parts, replaced differential fluid, checks tire pressure, checks that all fluids are topped off... Any suggestions? GRR!!!
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Replying to: jse107 (Jun 10, 2009 11:27 am) It's hard to say which way its going to go. I hope you get lucky. I'm thinking worst case scenario is that they'll offer a split settlement with you, and, short of legal action, that may be the best you can do--unless you want to haul the engine over to someone else to have it examined. The idea of a split settlement is that you got some use over the years and so aren't entitled to everything brand new.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jun 10, 2009 12:12 pm) My husband does the regular maintenece on this car with Honda parts--oil changes and so forth. He has it all in an Excel spreadsheet where he also tracks the gas mileage of the car for each fill-up. It's detailed, but I don't know if they're going to accept that. I'm very frustrated, especially because the reason we bought a Honda was for their excellent reliability. Makes me wonder about that now...
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