'94 Burb.. battery drain..

My 94 suburban has a battery drain issue. Brand new battery goes dead after about 6 - 7 days. Completely dead.

Doing some research on the internet, I found you can isolate the circuit that's at fault then from there, test wire/connections etc from said circuit.

Steps said to use a test light and unplug the negitave terminal from battery. Take the test light and jump in between the detached cable and the battery. Then start pulling fuses.. once the dim light goes out, thats the faulty circuit. Mine happend to be the ctsy fuse (Courtesy).

So I then went to the library and scanned the wiring diagram for the courtesy cirucit. My question is.. how am I supposed to test the circuit when its supposed to be hot? CTSY is supposed to be hot at all times, so how am I supposed to know which device or wires or whatever is the falulty one?

I assume using a voltmeter or ohmmeter would work better than a test light, but do I really need one of those? Am I wrong assuming the ctsy circuit is at fault? (it was the only one that turned off the test light, I yanked all the fuses).

Blitzburrgh, sounds like you have a bulb burning. I would think that you should be able to see it. Get in at night and look for any lights that might be left on. Is there a glove box light? How about a light under the hood? I have seen the hood light switch go bad and leave the under hood light on always. If either of these aren't going out it will drain the battery after a while. I am going to assume that you checked those things.

If I remember correctly you are right, the courtesy circuit is hot all the time and they use the switches and door pins to connect the circuit to ground, complete the circuit and the lights come on.

The reason I ask about the hood and glove box lights is because it seems to me a short before a light would cause the fuse to blow. Your drain is slow enough to not blow the fuse... like through a light bulb. How about the radio... does it stay on when you turn the ignition off? Any DVD players or video stuff? Anything plugged in to the cigarette lighters? My kids left their Nintendo DS's in the car once to charge them and killed the battery. Again, I am just throwing out things to look for.

Doug

I checked it at night.. just a few hours ago, and there is nothing lit up. No glove box, no under dash lights, no cargo area, no nothing. I pulled the two bulbs from under the hood.. the one on the underside of the hood and the one by the battery, one battery ago.. and have been out ever since. No bulbs = no drain, right, regardless if it would be stuck on?

Vehicle is bone stock, no aftermarket add-ons like DVD, alarm, etc. Raido turns off and cigarette lighter has nothing plugged into it.

The 'Burb has a switch.. 'auto or off' to where it wont turn on any courtsey bulbs when doors are opened. And thats been set to off two batterys ago.

Only thing I do know is that there are absolutley no bulbs lit up, anywhere.

Get an amp meter that will read miliamps.(.001) with everything off battery drain should be less that 50m(.050) Remove a battery cable and put the guage between the cable and the battery. Pull 1 fuse at a time until your reading is below 50m. This will be your battery drain. Fix that circuit.

Going to get a meter today. I drove it yesterday to pick up the kid from school, with the ctsy fuse out. What I found odd, that the radio didn't work. I know it needs a constant feed to keep the clock/station pre-sets, but why would the entire radio be fed off that circuit?

It doesn't turn on with the key out, but like most GM's, you can check the clock without the power on.. hence the ctsy hookup. I got a diagram of the ctsy circuit off a Haynes manual from the library yesterday, and the radio isn't on it.

I have the same problem and I may have had it for years and not known it. Recently I got a new car so the 97 Tahoe doesn't get driven often. It goes dead after just a few days sitting idle. The battery is literally brand new and the alternator charges fine and is about 9 month old.

I have no lights on that I can detect and I'm kind of a putz when it comes to tracking shorts. I was hoping this is something that is common on Chevy (Man I hate Delco stuff, its almost as bad a Lucas). If it helps, I noticed, when the battery was on its last legs, that there was a noise from under the dash much like the sound you get from a failed flasher. You know, the rapid click sound when you put a turn signal on. Its not that because the signals work and the sound seems to be more behind the lower dash where you can't see. Any idea?

had same problem found broken hinge on sun visor makeup light prob.gone

I finally took mine down to a local auto electric shop. They found the same broken hinge on the driver's side vanity mirror. The light wouldn't go off and it wasn't apparent with the lid closed and the sun visor up.
From the prior post, it looks like I'm not the first. Thinking it might get squashed and the hinge broken when trying to lock the visor back in place.