jbrittmart

it's been maybe 12 hours since I drove it last.

I've had dead batteries before but the lights still worked dimly and there were clicks when I tried to start... there was at least SOME level of life in the car... but now I get it... NOTHING.... doors won't lock or unlock... not one light comes on... nada.

any advice? I'm stumped.

jbrittmart

my power seats won't even adjust.... it's as if the car doesn't even have a battery in it at all.

the battery is less than 6 months old and it ran flawlessly 12 hours ago.

I've checked the terminals... they seem tight... I'll remove them for a few minutes, check the battery voltage and put them back on to see if anything resets.

any other advice is greatly appreciated. I'm supposed to have a date tonight... grrrr.

Timothyj

something wrong big time, my battery in my 04 ES lasted over 7 years. OEM battery should have lasted longer, something wrong, do you have a remote start?

jbrittmart

Yeah I fear it's something majorly wrong with my electrical system. No remote start.

I just don't understand how it happened overnight while it was sitting in the garage.

I fear I'll have to get it towed to Lexus.

jbrittmart

I removed the battery connections for a couple mins. Checked the battery with a multimeter and it has power. Reconnected and still nothing. Motherfocker.

I have a feeling this one is gonna hurt my wallet.

SBlexus

Do u have a battery charger, u might have left a interior light or something on. I would try another battery.

jbrittmart

I have a jump pack that I'm charging as we speak and I'll give that a try later, but I checked the battery with my multimeter. Not sure what it's supposed to read but it gave a value of 20 so at least it has some juice. I've left lights on all night before even headlights but there was still some juice and response.

SBlexus

Try this make sure your gearshift is all the way in park. I would manually shift it out of park and put it back in park or neutral and try to start it then.

jbrittmart

Thanks for the glimmer of hope. I'll give it a try when I get home, but won't get my hopes up.

SBlexus

Ok cool, and my last option is that u have a bad ignition switch.

SBlexus

But that wouldn't explain the headlights!!!!

jmcraney

Britt,

Please disconnect your battery from the car and connect it to a charger for about twelve hours and then try it again. I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

Regards,

Jeff

Lextrician

does it recognize the key ?? meaning you sit down put your foot on the brakes do you get that green light.. you need at least 10 vdc for it to start, does it even make an attempt???? just questions..

jmcraney

When the headlights are left on on these cars it completely discharges the battery. There is nothing left - it is dead, dead, dead. It is like not having a battery in it.

It is very difficult to determine the "State Of Charge" on a battery that has no load by using a multimeter.

Here is a State-of-charge versus Voltage table for 12V and 6V batteries. You can see that the accuracy and resolution of the voltmeter is very important if you try to evaluate batteries using this method. Even if you have a high resolution meter you don't know anything about the accuracy unless it has a recent calibration certification.



You can see from the table that a fully discharged 12V battery would have an open circuit voltage of 11.9 V.

If you want some confidence that your battery is good, and fully charged, you should remove it from the car and take it to a reputable battery dealer and have them test it.

madlad

Were lights set to "auto?" I had a similar problem months ago. Lights were set to auto, parked car in garage, went into house thinking they would go out in 30 seconds. They didn't and battery was dead next morning. Nothing worked. Called AAA and they couldn't start it without 2 batteries hooked up. My electric charger wouldn't charge it. Told my story to the dealer and they had no answer except to sell me a new battery. Now I watch to make sure the lights go off. If more than a couple of minutes passes and they're still on, I manually turn them off. Strange thing is, it only happened when the headlight came on after I entered the garage. If I were outside, the lights went off normally after shutting down. I posted this issue a year ago and got no definitve answer