The truck had no problems starting until I hooked up a new cd player with a power amp. I spent extra cash getting all these capacitors and whatnot as to not drain excessive power from the battery (at least I think thats what it does), but by the second or so day I noticed it would take a few more cranking cycles at startup to go.

After a few weeks my truck would turn up dead in the morning as Im on my way to work. After a few days of jump starts, I took the truck to autozone to determine if i needed a new battery, alternator, fuel pump, or whatever it might be. Initiall, the 1st battery read was ok at somewhere around 12-13 volts, but the second read was much lower around 8-9 volts. They were ready to sell me a new battery until I tried starting it and the guy noticed I had ample cranking power, it just wouldnt turn over. He checked fuel pressure, which was fine so I guess that rules out the pump.

So it was determined that while I do need to get my battery replaced, it is not the source of the problem. My amp was properly turning off after vehicle shutdown as well so that was not the cause. I had the power wire disconnected from the amp for the last few days of this problem and there was still the power deficit.

Any of you guys know what is going on here? Just so you know I have done ample searches on this site before posting, but I still am out of luck. Feedback is much appreciated, thanks.

-jim

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do you guys think that i need to look into the ignition switch....or might it be something else? Please help, im dying over here.

do you guys think that i need to look into the ignition switch....or might it be something else? Please help, im dying over here.

I had a similar problem after I hooked up a new radio in my car. It turned out to be a short. I basically had a continual 3 amp draw on the battery, through the radio or the clock or something because I had wired it directly to the unswitched battery + terminal by mistake.

It sounds to me like you have a short. Get out a multimeter and start checking wires. I am not sure how easy or hard that is on a Blazer.

Who installed the amp. Did it get connected to two power supplies , one switched and one to a full time hot ? Most amp I have installed have a red and a yellow . The red going to the battery , yellow to an output from the radio or switched fuse circuit. If they are connected to the same source , it will keep draining your battery while you are not using the car .Rob

Well, I paid a professional shop good $$$ to do it figuring it would be done right, because I always did it before with my buddies and something would always end up going wrong eventually.

Im not sure if it got connected to 2 power supplies or not, all I can see is one heavy guage power cable running to my battery, which I ended up disconnecting once it started really getting hard to start.

Funny thing is, I took this now dead battery completely out of the truck to charge it overnight a few days ago. Of course it was dead when I checked it in the morning, but I still put it back into the truck for the hell of it. When I touched the truck's pos & negative lines to the battery terminals, I got sparks, which to me signaled that the truck was still drawing power from something, but what, I dunno.

I was already thinking that this purportedly "reputable" install shop took more of my money than necessary, now I find out that they probably did a suck ass job too? WTF. Thanks for the feedback guys - anybody know what to look for now, and/or how to fix this?

You know that little light in the engine compartment , Is it hood mounted ? one of my vehicles had a metal ball inside that was stuck and kept the light on 24/7. after charging it twice , I went out to get in one night and saw light shining on the ground under it. Rob

The sparks you saw when tryting to hook the dead battery up were probably coming from the charged capacitors you had installed.

Often adding audio equipment to a system with a battery that is already weak or is just not up to speed will quickly kill off the battery. The same goes for alternators. If it was an AC Delco battery, then I don't doubt that it was already problematic and just had not reared its ugly head yet. Those batteries are horrible.

Other things to consider - if the ground connection from the amplifier to the chassis is not solid, it can go in and out and drain or damage the battery. If the capacitors are not charged prior to installation, they will do the exact opposite of what they are intended to do and will create more strain on the battery and alternator - but it sounds like teh caps were charged due to the sparks you described.

I actually just noticed that light under the hood yesterday when I was checking around in there....but the bulb itself is smashed out and all that remains is the screw part, so that can't be it.

The ground seems to be pretty solid, they have it mounted on one of the screws underneath the rear seat that goes into the floorboard.

In regards to the power draw, when I was under the hood with a voltometer, I hooked it up to the pos and neg lead wires to see what and how much power was being sucked out. Most of the time it didnt read anything, but every now and then the needle on the meter would jump fast & hard for a sec then go back to reading nothing.

I think based on the advice here im just going to get a new yellow top, seeing how at this point I need a new battery anyway. I would have got one earlier but I was afraid that I might ruin it by running it dead. The old battery was one of those cheapie wal mart ones, that came (new) with the truck when I bought it exactly 2 years ago. Prior to this problem I probably ran it dead from being stupid (left interior light on, etc.) a good 3-4 times anyway, and then another half dozen or better times just in the last week.

Im hoping that just a new battery will solve the problem. If anyone has any other ideas, please don't hesitate. Thanks to everyone else who has chimed in, it helps alot. - Jim