I want to check my current draw on my battery. I have borrowed a craftsman 82400 multimeter but i dont have the manual for it. It can read up to 20 amps. I disconnected the neg lead and placed the multimeter in the amp settings. with the neg lead in the COM hole and the pos. lead in the ohms hole. If I connect the pos lead to the battery and the neg lead to the ground wire I get .25amps if I reverse the leads I get .6 amps. If I move the pos lead over to the 20amp hole I get .3amps either way I connect the leads to the battery and cable.

Which way is correct and am I doing something wrong?

 

Neg lead to common and pos lead to AMP hole on meter. You can usually find a manual online. At least on every meter I've owned.

 

Positive lead should plug in to amps input on multi-meter.

 

^^Beat me to it!

 

I tried this on another truck and when plugged into the amp hole it does nothing. From what I have read it can be plugged into either hole and read amps. The 20 amp is just when you have higher amps. Also when I make the conections if I would turn on a light should it turn on. For some reasen it doest seem to make the series and turn the light on.

 

Does your meter have a miliamp setting? This may be why you are not getting a reading in the AMP setting.

 

Update
Testing the correct way I am showing.25 amps + - . If not mistaken that is 250 miliamps. I pulled every fuse and relay and the only thing that changed the current draw was the battery saver relay in the inside fuse box. It took it down to .17 amps. The other fuse that did any thing was maxi fuse 105 under the hood. The manual says it is the junction box battery feed. I also disconnected the altenator wires at the alenator and also disconected my brake controller and scangauge 2. Any ideas?

 

Radio. Memory in it draws constantly.

 

I know about the radio but 250ma is way too much for that.

 

Sounds like you have something shorting out to ground.

 

.25 amps isn't much at all, thats inline with the memory for the radio and all the other power functions, the theft light, keyless entry system, etc.

I haven't actually run mine on the excursion but when i did car stereos I checked current draw on a ton of cars (sometimes a poorly installed radio would create a slow current draw and drain batteries and I had to fix it) and I found the average car would draw around .2 amps.