Hey,

I have a 1995 Honda Civic SI. The other night I was driving and the battery light came on. The car slowly died and I got towed to a shop where they replaced my alternator. Following that I drove the car home and everything seemed fine. The next morning my battery was dead. Living on a hill I "bomb' started the car. When I did this the car started, but smoke came out of my stereo and the SRS light came on. My stereo does not work now. Thinking I had a dead battery (from the drain from the alternator incident) I replaced it. Next morning it was the same thing.

So I have something draining my battery. The SRS light is still on. My stereo doesn't work. My clock is only on dimly and when I turn the car off and turn it back on the clock resets to 1:00 (in other words if I am driving for 10 minutes the clock will read 1:10, then I turn it off and back on and the clock resets to 1:00). I am assuming some short from where the smoke came out of my stereo (or is this just my stereo blown from something else). Any suggestions on where to proceed from here (I only have basic car knowledge, but would like to try and fix it myself).

Thanks in advance.

 

my question is WTF does "BOMB"start the car mean?????

if your radio had a puff of smoke them its probably dead... but since you said your clock resets then your memory fuse under the hood is blown. DO NOT I REPEAT DO NOT replace the fuse with a higher rated fuse. if you do you risk frying the rest of your wiring. if it blows instantly then first thing to do is pull the radio out and inspect the wiring on it. and then unplug the radio and then put a new fuse in it if the wiring doesnt look burnt or melted. if they do then you must inspect the wiring really good and replace those sections with the same gauge wire also.

but if the wiring looks good and the radio is unpluged and it doesnt blow the fuse again then its just your radio is fried and needs replaced.

 

Yeah unplug the radio; it's dead anyway. Temporarily disconnect any aftermarket amps as well. Then replace the back up fuse under the hood and see if the rest of the car is OK.

Sounds like he's talking about simply roll-starting a manual car. It would never occur to me to call that "bomb starting," because it is almost completely silent when done properly.

 

i call it push starting. but theres no way that should make anything smoke out like that. unless it is truely a crappy radio that couldnt take the low voltage.

 

Replaced the backup fuse, it was definitely blown. Car battery still seems to be draining. In about an hour went from 12.14 volts to 11.80 volts. It did not blow the fuse again. Does this mean there is a short somewhere, do I need to pull the radio? Any suggestions on getting the radio out of the dash. It is an aftermarket JVC cd player and I can't seem to slide it out of the casing.

 

Oh and the SRS light is still on. The clock is now working fine and keeping time even when the car is shut off

 

Pulled out the stereo and inspected the wires and everything looks good. Not sure what is up? I even got the radio to work on the player, but not the cd. Didn't blow the fuse in the stereo, I think maybe something blew in the cd portion? Anyway, there is still a big drain. I left it for an hour and went from 12.3 Volts to 11.6 volts, then left it for another hour and it dropped all the way to 5 volts. This is a new battery. Could it be an alternator problem. Also when the original problem happened I found that the fuse for my daytime running lamps was blown. Replaced the fuse and now only one daytime running lamp works. Could this be part of the problem? As you can see I am quite lost.

 

Voltage at the battery with the engine running, but everything else off, should be more than 14 volts. If not the alternator is not charging it.

12.3 volts is pretty much a flat battery to begin with. It won't take much to run it the rest of the way down. Also running a battery down to 5 volts will permanently damage it quick, even if it is brand new.