I've got a constant battery drain that will depletes the battery in 4 or 5 days. I connected a meter between the negative post and the negative cable and found it was a .14 amp draw with the doors closed and nothing on. I want to pull a fuse at a time to see which circuit is causing the drain but I have to open the doors to do that. With the dome lights on, I can't tell what I'm doing. I haven't tried taking the bulbs out of the dome lights and see if I can get the draw back down to the .14 amp base.

Can anyone tell me what the base draw should be with nothing on. I've gone through 3 batteries (under warranty) since this started about a year or so ago. I keep a BatteryMinder float charger on it now so the battery won't go dead. The HHR is my back up. It's a 2009 LT2 with less than 60,000 miles on it. It does a lot of sitting. It hasn't gotten any worse or fixed itself so I guess I'm going to have to find the cause and fix it myself.

(My everyday driver is a 1997 Aerostar with only 230,000 miles on it and still going strong. I figure miles don't count on it anymore.)

 

Should be 50ma or less. You want to bypass any switches (door or hood) to keep from skewing your results.

 

Leave the door(s) open for 15 minutes and the system times out and shuts off the interior lights.
Or, open the door and wedge something in there to depress the door plunger.

 

You could start with the underhood fuse box, then go buy a flashlight or use the light on your cell phone..
Do you leave anything plugged into the power outlets (cig lighters)?
Do you have ANY after market additions? Radio, LEDs,etc.
Have you tried pulling fuse #24 on the BCM fuse box? (OnStar & XM)
Are there any OBD codes present?
How long after all doors are closed are you testing?
.14 amp works out to 16.8 AH over 5 days, a car battery should have around 40 - 65 AH available.
Check all of the door switches.
Check the tail gate, is it fully latched?
Hood switch working right?

 

What do you mean by “deplete the battery”? To what voltage does it drop? Or if you don’t know, do you mean it just won’t start? How old is the battery. (Please answer everything as completely as you can.)

 

By "deplete" I mean when I try to open the door with the keyfob, nothing happens. When I unlock it with the key and open the door, the dome light won't light.

Before I posted this new topic, I'd tried searching for battery troubles without finding anything worthwhile. The forum did a better job than me by finding these "Related Topics"
HHR parasitic (phantom, mystery) electrical drain, dead battery

Battery drain

Battery woes

I'll be reading through them as well as your replies here. Seems like another HHR "feature" at this point. Oh happy day!

 

I don’t agree that it’s an HHR feature, could be a number of things, possibly the PO installed something aftermarket, fog lights, stereo equipment, LED lights and resistors.
Then again, rodents do love a hood feast on wiring insulation, could be a chafed wire on the driver’s side end of the engine above the transmission.
Happy hunting!

 

I'm the original owner and have never installed anything but a set of diodes for the tail lights so I can tow it with my motorhome. The tail lights either get power from the motorhome or the HHR. I can't see that being an issue. I haven't towed the HHR in a long time (I've been towing the Aerostar).
The only gadget I have is a MP3 player I plug into the power outlet (formerly cigarette lighter) when I'm using it. I do leave its speaker cable plugged into the "Aux Input" but there shouldn't be any power on that.
I think this problem started after I'd left the HHR setting over the winter. I pulled the battery, took it inside and left it hooked to a BatteryMinder float charger all winter. After I got back and reinstalled the battery, it started going down in just a few days. That ruined the battery which was just over 3 years old. I bought a new one at Costco but in just a few months, it wouldn't start the HHR or take a charge. It had a 3 year replacement warranty so I swapped it for another. A few days after that, I couldn't start it again and lights were very dim. That's when I connected the BatteryMinder to the battery and ran a cord out the back hatch to keep it plugged in. The BatteryMinder has been doing a good job but shouldn't be necessary. This wasn't a problem a couple of years ago.

 

Unhook the alternator and see if the draw goes normal. If no change you need to start pulling things. First start with the BCM and ABS and any other modules. Anything that has a motor ie. windows seats etc

 

Left car sitting over the winter? Mice and other rodents love HHR wiring and air filters.