[Morrie]

I hooked up my new Nuvi 500 a month ago, knowing that the LED on the power cord would produce a slight drain, but I didn't think it would be much. I put the battery tender on the bike and left it for a month. Today the battery was completely dead. It was down so far that the battery tender couldn't sense the 3 volts it needs to activate, so I was getting the flashing red light disconnect signal from the tender. Interestingly, the Nuvi was also completely discharged.

I pulled the fuse on the Nuvi and put my car charger on at 2 amps for long enough to get the battery to recognize the tender, which now indicates it's charging. Someone on here earlier posted that he ran a voltmeter across the GPS connection and found no detectable draw.

Unless there's something else going on, it appears that the GPS power cord is pulling enough to overcome the normal 1.4 amp charge of the battery tender. I don't see how an LED could do that. Does anyone have an idea?

 

[DougP]

Morrie,

I may have been the one that you are referring to about the AMPERAGE draw with the CONVERTER only connected to the battery. I also noted the AMPERAGE draw with the GPS connected to the converter. You might want to review the post. But, to summarize: no noticeable CURRENT draw with ONLY the converter connected. That was the main concern the original poster had. But, there is measurable CURRENT draw when the GPS is connected. I would never leave the GPS connected unless the converter connection was wired to be switched off when the bike is not running.

Sorry to hear about the problems you are having, though.

 

[Morrie]

Hey, thanks. I'll see how it goes with the GPS disconnected from the converter.