85 milliamp current draw is certainly a bit above normal . . . less than 50 milliamps is normal, in my book, FWIW . . . but it shouldn’t cause a dead battery every single night
IMO . . . a 85 milliamp draw will kill the battery in several days, if the vehicle isn’t regularly started and driven
“The only time the reading changed was when I put the ignition on which put it up to something like (I don’t remember exactly) 96mA”
There’s something wrong here . . . if you have the meter set up to measure current, and you turned on the ignition, it should read WAY higher than 96 milliamps
I’m beginning to suspect you’re somehow reading the meter’s display in an incorrect way.
Perhaps it read 0.85A, and you thought it meant 85 milliamps. If so, you are incorrect. 0.85A is actually 850 milliamps, which is very high, and will quickly kill any battery
Please don’t take offense to what I suggested
What scale are you using . . . or is your meter autoranging?
If the OP were using the ohm scale for a phantom current measurement, it’s unlikely to read 85 mA set up like that. So I expect they are doing it correctly. 85 mA phantom current is probably correct, and that draw isn’t at all unusual in newer vehicles according to the reports we get here. The OP is probably correct that something is turning on later and causing a much bigger current drain. Again, that’s not an unusual thing to happen with newer cars these days, what with the number of computers they have. Faulty door switches are a known source for this to happen. There are cell-phone apps you can download which will cause the phone to automatically take a photo every few minutes, so that could be a method for a diyer to monitor the current display overnight.
The other likely explanation is that the phantom draw isn’t the problem, and the battery isn’t being properly charged during day to day driving.
Here’s another possibility . . . OP may also be sticking the leads in the wrong sockets in the meter
Gearheads like us know that for measuring current, the leads are not in the same sockets, versus measuring voltage and resistance
Another possibility . . . OP already blew the meter’s high amp fuse. Most of us know this is very easy to do. Thus, the meter is incapable of correctly reading the actual current draw
Even my cheap – i.e. free – dvm shows the units being displayed as well as the numbers. If it says mA for the units, and 85 for the numbers, it would be hard to believe the meter and the lead placements on both ends weren’t properly configured for the measurement.
Speaking of having the leads in the wrong socket. My positive lead kept coming out and there is no indication which hole to put it in. Evidently I got the wrong one when I was checking house current on a GFI socket. Big spark and blew the breaker. Didn’t seem to hurt anything though, just put a big black mark on the terminal screw. Shook me up a little. Got it marked now.