Why does my battery keep draining until it goes bad?

Maintenance/Repairs
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1 
 I own a 99 Oldsmobile Cutlass.  It has about 120,000 miles on it and has had no major problems with it.  However, about 5 months ago I put a new battery in it.  3 months later it went completely dead.  The car would not jump start and the battery had no voltage (no lights on or doors left open).  I took it back to the place that sold it to me and they tried to charge it, but it wouldn't hold a charge.  They told me I probably had a faulty battery and replaced it free of charge.  Just last week the same thing happened again, so now I suspect a drain somewhere in my system.


When it is cold a sound like my emergency blinkers going off will occurr, but none of my blinkers will be flashing. It just makes the sound as if they are. When I push my emergency flashers button a few times, or turn my blinkers on and off, it will eventually quit. However, when it makes the noise nothing flashes and it will do it for 30-90 seconds. This has been occuring intermittingly for about a year now, usually during cold weather.

I am now wondering if their is some connection between these two items.



Any thoughts?

2

Sounds like a problem with the blinker unit. Next time you hear it clicking look under the dash and follow your ears. It’s a small metal or plastic cased unit with an electrical connector. Remove it and take it to a parts place or a dealer. If it’s not too expensive just replace it and see how it goes.

You also need to get your charging system tested.

3

The trouble with the flasher unit may be with it, the turn signal switch, or in the flasher switch wiring. The lights aren’t turning because the switch isn’t connected but somehow the flasher is turning on. Swapping in a new flasher may be the easiest thing to try and fix it without trouble shooting things.