Would 85mA drain the battery too quickly?

[Raistlin]

As subject.

I'd be grateful for any opinions please?

I am intending to wire my gps receiver to a permanent live and according to the GPS manual, it draws 85mA.

Would that be too much of a drain on the car battery assuming the car is driven each day Monday to Friday?

Thanks

[Phil]

I think you can only have 2 or 3 ma drain. Or is that 2 or 3 amps, I'm not sure, one or other anyway.

[pondweed]

I've just had a look in the t80 telestart fitting instructions and for comparison, that draws less than 1mA...

[Livermpj]

Hi Paul,
85mA drain is Ok if the car's used regularly, it equates to 2AH per day.

Coincidentally, the standard electronics on the car draws about the same current (I measured 80mA on my CDT club), although I believe it may drop after a period of inactivity when some of the ECUs go into power-saving sleep mode.
With a decent battery I can leave my car for a couple of weeks and it'll start OK - so I suppose you could say that with your 85mA GPS receiver connected, you should be OK for 1 week (that's about 14AH drain into your GPS receiver).

Cheers,
Pete.

[Raistlin]

Thanks everybody.

Having given it further thought, I suspect that the ephemera data backup battery might be faulty.

I'll have to make enquiries with their tech support.

[Departed]

5-10mA is reasonable to give a decent life when standing at an airport for example.

85mA isn't going to cause you a problem overnight, or over weekends, but might be a bit much if you went away on holiday. Remeber the car will be taking it's own current too. 80mA for the standard car seems high, but they do drop off over time as systems shut down. I know some cars that take 30 minutes to get to a proper sleep state.

14AH is a fair bit out of a normal 90AH battery. If it's not fully charged at the start, you could be down to close on 50% charge after a couple of weeks which could be borderline for starting if it's cold.

[TJ 75Diesel estate]

Maplins does a solar panel that gives a good trikle charge.
Only a tenner too.

Worth a thought

[Keith]

Paul
2A drain a day is not to be recommended it might not sound like much but it will knock down the battery voltage, you could find although in theory there is still plenty of power to crank the engine that the voltage has dropped to the point where you get the flashing headlight syndrome

I would not risk it

PS Spent the day at Cosford yesterday, new exhibit is impressive

[JohnDotCom]

PS Spent the day at Cosford yesterday, new exhibit is impressive

Pics or more Info Keith? :)