Luckycharm1

Truck stuck at doctors office!

The truck started without issue this morning after sitting for two days unplugged in 20-30 degree (F) temperatures. I drove about 10 miles, the truck came up to temperature and heater and headlights all worked fine. After sitting for 2 hours I came out and the FOB would not unlock the doors, then I found the truck had no power. As in, no crank, no interior lights, no horn, nothing.

I looked under the hood at the obvious, including both fuse boxes seeing nothing obvious without disassembling anything before my ride picked me up. I left the truck where it is as of now, but hope I could get some guidance on what I might be able to check or troubleshoot and not have to have the truck towed. I'm thinking my first thing to check is the batteries, they are just over a year old of non-heavy use. I'm going to take them out and have them load tested. Any ideas on what else it could be would be greatly appreciated!

patdaly

Man, I can't think of anything other than perhaps the grid heaters being stuck on that could drain batteries that fast.

Just for grins, did you happen to notice the action of the heaters when you started it up? ( Voltmeter up and down )

Luckycharm1

I let it cycle before I started it at the house, as normal, and all seemed fine. I can't say that I remember looking at the voltmeter, but there was definitely nothing obvious. If it was stuck on, it should have shut off when I turned the ignition off, right?

torquefan

Nope, if one of the relay contacts sticks, it will be drawing about 100 amps from the batteries at all times. Patdaly made a good suggestion, it sounds like a strong possibility.

Luckycharm1

Now that you mention this, when I was looking under the hood I noticed the air intake on top of the grid heater was a brown/burnt color about up to the elbow. I didn't think much of it at the time as the engine bay was filthy from all the winter weather. Based on this, I'm pretty sure the batteries are completely dead due to the grid heater.

Now what do I do? I'm not even sure I have the tools or expertise to make any repairs myself. Is this an easy swap of a relay, or is this a solenoid somewhere? Maybe I can get it to fire up without the heater to get it home if I can get it disconnected first.

Tallguy67

Lucky, you will get the most help if you start a thread about this in the 2nd gen 24 valve section. That being said, before we start throwing parts around, let's do some diagnosis. I would suggest you completely disconnect the batteries and get a charger on them. You want to disconnect the batteries because if the grid heater relay is is stuck in the closed position, you will never get a charge into the battery. Once you get a good charge into the batteries, hook up the negative cable to one battery and then measure the amps going between the positive battery post of the battery you hooked up and the positive cable.
Let us know how much current is getting drawn.
BTW, replacing the relay is a simple job if it is stuck closed.

patdaly

BINGO!

Ok, now we can get you home.

All you really need to do is disconnect the heaters at the solenoids, which are mounted on the drivers side inner fender, just back and below the batteries. What you are looking to do is disconnect the big wires leading from the heater to the solenoids AT the solenoids, on the side the wire comes in from the heater. By disconnecting them at this point, that the solenoid is stuck will not matter, and there will be no chance of a wire shorting out.

Here is a pictorial of what you are looking at.



Unless it is very cold, she should start up fine. Don't get taken on the price for a new solenoid pack, about 55-60 bucks at Rock Auto, though my buddy found the same thing ( and price ) at our local Auto Zone.

Luckycharm1

I've got the batteries on a charge in the garage right now. I feel pretty comfortable disconnecting the wiring. Could I not just disconnect the wires where they connect to the positive terminal on the battery post instead of on the solenoid while I have all that disconnected and achieve the same results, and be safe?

I've also attached a few photos. The wiring at the heater appears to have melted the boots that covers the nuts. For the most part the wiring upon visual inspection down at the solenoids looks ok with the exception of one of the boots I zoomed in on, but no where near as bad as right at the heater.

I'm going to go see if I can get her home today and get all this taken care of. Thank you gentlemen for your help so far and I apologize for the delay in replying. My wife was admitted to the hospital, hence the reason the truck got stuck at the doctor's office.

Oh, and I noticed my radiator is leaking! Appears to be where the plastic sides are connected to the aluminium. When it rains it pours.

patdaly

Yep, you can disconnect at the battery and be just as safe. I just wasn't sure how they connected at the battery side on your truck.

The wiring definitely took some amperage, I would wring out ( test ) the wiring to make sure it didn't melt thru to ground or to the other wire. Just a VOM ( Volt Ohm Multimeter ) and check to make sure ohms to ground or the other is not 0 ( connected, not infinity which it should be.

She might start a touch rough depending on the temperature, but it won't hurt anything to run it without the heaters until you get your wife back on track.

Let us know how you fared, and when you get ready to fix this, post a new thread down in the 24 V forum and we can get you back 100 percent.

patdaly

Did you get it home?

Jim Lane

That looks more like a loose connection than a stuck solenoid.

Jim

torquefan

I think so too. It would be very easy for the OP to verify by putting everything back together and using an amp clamp to see if there's heavy current going to the heaters when there shouldn't be.

delta1991

I have a 2012 ram 3500 that died no electical anywhere no nothing dash horn start headlights etc nothing batteries are great any Ideas?

Doubledogdown

Check the battery on the fob. It's probably dead in which your alarm is activated. I think if you put your key in the door and lock it and unlock it a couple times it might turn off the alarm allowing it to start... My current truck will just shut off when I'm driving sometimes I mess with the battery cables and then it starts right up

SIXSLUG

Hopefully it still isn't sitting at the Doctors office....this post was from 8 years ago....