Driving without instrument cluster

[JohnZ]

It's weird because I didn't have any evidence at all that the battery was eventually draining. We even restarted the car several times and had it going at idle to check a couple of things together, fans went on and off several times, and the next day the car fired up like a champ! So it was as if everything was working properly as usual! I would assume that the car was driven for about two hours totally with no binnacle. Maybe the electric consumption of the D is not that high? I don't know!

Anyway, glad that everything was ok! And thanks Jesse, I'll definitely try out your methods to make that "sucker" of an instrument panel work properly again!

[dn010]

Only way to know for sure what is going on is to put a volt meter on the battery while you're running without the cluster and see what voltage you're getting.

[Bitsyncmaster]

You got my interest.

I just tested my cars current draw at idle with nothing on. Used my clamp on DC current meter set at 20 amp scale and current draw is 12.25 amps at idle. Now my voltage at idle is quite high at 14.5 volts so if your running without the alternator I would expect that current draw is a little less.

I measured that current on the wire feeding the battery feed through bolt in the coil cover area.

You may get a little higher (maybe half amp) because I have the RPM, Lambda, and AUX relays solid state, which are the relays running with engine on.

Door closed and E brake off so those lights are not on.

[David T]

Assuming you are starting out with a good battery and it is fully charged, and the electrical system is in good "knick", the car should run for a while. Of course it will depend on how much you also use any accessories like lights, fans, radio, etc because any extra loads will shorten how long the battery can maintain enough voltage to run the ignition system. Either the motor will start to miss because the ignition ECU doesn't have enough voltage or if you shut off the motor the starter won't have enough power from the battery to restart the motor. Driving at night with the lights on or a lot of traffic and the brake lights coming on will shorten the length of time you can run. One car I had, (not a Delorean), when the charging system failed, I could always tell because the radio would lose stations. A battery pack will extend your range. Another thing to remember, as the voltage decreases the amperage draw will go up so you may start popping fuses.

[JohnZ]

Of course we are all talking about a case study, because nobody which was sound in mind would drive under those conditions willfully... It would just be an emergency kind of attitude. Nevertheless it's good to speculate about it, and/or do the maths!

Inviato dal mio moto g42 utilizzando Tapatalk