Door open always draws 500ma

there may be other things the doors fire up. is there a difference between the drivers door and the other 3?

 

Are there footwell lights, the little hidden ones that light up where your feet go? Any lights in the door?

I would concentrate on eliminating the problem, just get into a checking routine.

 

I’m always the last one to leave our Prius for that reason.

The wife is the usual transporter of our 2 kids. I have come home from work to find the light on in her new car.

I don’t think our 12v in the RX will last as long as the 12v has in our Prius (8.5 years and counting).

But that’s what the BatteryMINDer 1510 is for.

 

Puddle lights?

Does your Gen II have SKS?

 

Yes, it is, although after about 5 min some things shut down and the load goes to about 200 mA. With a door open the car will never fully quiesce. Normal quiescent load is 20 mA

+1

The easiest way to do this, is to lock the car every time. No lock, one or more doors are not closed properly.

 

Yes probably "normal".
Having kids "play" in the car is NOT normal though.
Please get all the drivers in the habit of LOCKING it when parked.......everywhere.

 

I don't lock ours in the garage, cuts down the number of times the car is locked/unlocked by maybe 75~80%. I've heard of locking mechanisms failing, being an expensive fix. But I am hyper careful about door closings.

The last fail was with grandkids, about 4 years back: got everyone out of the car, was distracted, left one door ajar for about 18 hours. That was enough to take it down to 11.9 volts. I revived with charger, but replaced it 2 years later, preemptively.

 

I don't know if 500 mA is normal but if it's the driver lots of stuff is happening. I wouldn't be surprised if it exceeded that amount. A lot of stuff happens to prep the car.

If it's the other doors, there is the door switch which is the rubber nubbin in between the doors. There is the courtesy light on the door itself. There are the foot well lights if so equipped. There is the instrument cluster indicator for door ajar. Does that add up to 500 mA. Maybe.

 

I’ve trained my 6 and 5 year olds to slam the door close.

Since they don’t know how to control themselves, it worked.

Haven’t shattered the glass yet.

 

Do you have SKS and did you have the key fob with you when you walked up to the car? If you did you will not see the lowest current draw, as the car wakes up when you approach the car.

If you are saying that all doors are closed and your car does not have SKS or you left the key fob well away from the car and you still are seeing 500 mA all the time, then 500 mA is too much and indicates there is something that is not going to sleep. Tracing a parasitic draw is very time consuming. There was a thread here in the Gen 2 forums where a guy detailed his quest tracking down and fixing his parasitic drain.

Out of interest, how are you measuring the current draw?

 

have we discussed the 12v health yet?

 

We don’t want to steal your thunder .

 

thanks! if it's original, replace it!

 

How would the 12 V, bad or otherwise, cause these symptoms?

 

perhaps the doors being opened for a short time is killing a weak battery.

 

Even if that is true, it doesn't fix the problem. The source of the constant draw needs to be located and rectified, otherwise the OP will just be replacing battery after battery.

If the source of the constant draw really is that the doors cannot be secured correctly on a consistent basis, then so be it.