How long does it take hazard lights to kill a vehicle's battery?

[DerbyDad03]

The machines have been parked in the exact same location every night for close to 3 weeks now. They are off the road on a flat section of land along side the wooded hill that overlooks the bay. This was the first time they flashers were on.

It's interesting how they park the vehicles. They have been using 3 pieces of equipment for the gas main project. A small Cat excavator, a larger Cat with a dozer bucket and excavator bucket and some kind of a compressor device that they tow around. Each night they position the trailer tightly between the 2 Cats so it can't be moved back or forth. They place the excavator bucket of the smaller cat on the street side of the compressor so it can't be swung towards the street. There's no sense in swinging it away from the street because it's too close to the wooded hill so you could never get it out that way. Finally, they put the excavator bucket from the

He gave me his number so that I could set the appointment to have them hook up my service. It seems like they have no real plan for the individual services part of the project. Last Friday they were working down the block when I came out to go to work. They waved me down and asked when they could hook up my house. "It'll only take a couple of hours, we could do it today." I told them I had to check my schedule at work. He gave me his number so I could call and set it up a time. I called and and asked for a Monday morning appt and they said fine. Seems like they have no pattern, they're just hooking up services whenever the homeowner is available. Maybe as the project winds down they'll have to be more organized, but as long as they can do 2 or 3 houses a day, I guess it doesn't matter which house they do when.

I left him my number when I called about the lights. He didn't call me back the next day and I don't plan to call him.

Oh, I'm sure I had no legal right to be in the vehicle. I'm pretty sure that if I had done something wrong, like started it up and crushed the compressor or drove the Cat over the hill, my phone would have been ringing real early that morning.

Now that's a stretch!

None of which will be asked. :-)

I could have stolen the boatload of empty water and sports drink bottles that were piled up inside the cab. Turned them all in for the nickel deposit. My wife will deny the accomplices claim.

We've been fine since Monday. They may be waiting until they finish all the houses and then get us all on the same day.

[DerbyDad03]

Both Cats have been parked in the same off-the-road spot for 3 weeks. That night was the only night the flashers were on. They haven't been on for the last 2 nights.

I guess someone could run into the machines since they are right near the road, but drivers could also fall into ditches protected only by that orange hazard fence or run into one of the many dirt or gravel piles that are only marked by cones.

Heck for that matter, drivers could just drive off the road and roll down the hill into the bay. There's no protection from that.

[Nightcrawler®]

Some places up there they never turn off their engines unless they can get the vehicle/equipment inside.

[nestork]

I know that semi-trailers will idle their engines all night long while the driver is sleeping, but often that's because the engine is operating the heating or air conditioning system in the sleeper behind the cab. So, the truck is locked and the driver is right on site, albeit fast asleep.

But, I'd say it's kinda pushing your luck to leave heavy equipment idling and unattended all night long, even in the bush. Those big diesel engines make a lot of noise, and out in the bush where you don't have any other noise, sound carries for miles. The sound of a continuously idling diesel engine is going to attract the attention of people inclined to steal equipment like that. It might still be there in the morning, but if you make a habit of leaving it idling and unattended at night, it's not going to be there in the morning for very long.

[Nightcrawler®]

I imagine that the heavy equipment has some heavy duty engine heaters that require an APU to fire up. I cannot fathom trying to fire up an engine that was left overnight in sub-zero temps. I hear that any equipment left for an amount of time out there needs to be towed and heated up before they can be re-started.

Down here in the states some of the small internal combustion gen-sets have heaters in their filter housings (1.5ft dia x 4.5ft) and circulate the oil until a block temperature switch enables the start sequence. They all have a pre-lube cycle, anyway, this is just another level of protection in the event the grid kicks the plant offline for an extended period of time, or if there is a step-up transformer/re-closure problem.

[nestork]

I suppose that if the equipment can be moved to a warmer location, that'd be the way to go, but often the equipment can't really be moved. For example, the diesel engines in a mining drag line or oil drilling rig. You can't move the diesel engine in an oil drilling rig without moving the rig, and it takes several days to set up the rig and take it down. Having to do all that just because an engine won't start isn't economic when you have to pay the crew a daily wage even when they're not working.

In those cases, there are still ways to start cold diesel engines. I've seen one case where you can set up quick connect fittings (like the kind on compressed air lines) on the engine of a pick up truck and the engine of a bull dozer (for example). You connect the pick-up truck's engine to the bulldozer engine with hoses so that hot engine oil from the pick up truck's engine flows through the engine of the bulldozer. After a while, all of the oil in both engines is hot, and the bulldozer will be much easier to start.

On really large diesel engines, like the diesel engine in a locomotive, they will typically use an electrically powered coolant preheater. The coolant preheater is entirely electric and both heats and pumps hot coolant through the diesel engines's water jacket, thereby warming up the entire engine. If the engine can't be brought to the preheater, the preheater can be brought to the engine, but in that case you also need to take along a gasoline powered generator to provide the electrical power the preheater needs.

'Machinery-Heavy Equipment Engine Heating Products | HOTSTART'

[Robert Green]

That pretty much destroys my contention they were deliberately left on. )-:

Yes, those are typical anti-theft precautions. Around here (near D.C.) you will often see a small compressor or generator unit left hanging in the air from a crane to keep them from "sleepwalking" if you know what I mean. (-:

An interesting perspective - they take the targets of opportunity first, which makes sense when you consider all the variables in dealing with homeowners during the workday.

Well, I think you've already answered the important question and proved that you really did do a mitzvah by turning off the flashers. Mazel Tov!

When I was a kid we lived next to a fuel oil company and one of their trucks was left out on the street without any brakes on. The slope of the street was small but noticeable (it took much more effort to pedal up the block than down. Imperceptibly, the truck started to roll and within a short time was moving at a very good clip. One of the neighbor teens managed to climb up into the cab and stop the truck before it did considerable damage. He became a neighborhood hero.

From what I've seen of the problems they often have starting heavy equipment up, I can't imagine anything accidental you might have done that would have resulted in a runaway Cat. IOW, I don't see any *real* downside to turning off the flashers other than you might have fallen off while climbing down. I suppose there could have been a "deadfall" set up to injure potential thieves, but that would have been unlikely even though heavy equipment thefts are on the rise:

Where do you sell a huge highway grader or bulldozer? Craig's list? (-;

Well, considering we've been entertained by the possibility they rented out all this heavy equipment and performed actual maintenance work just to get to burglarize your house, it's not a BIG stretch. (-:

Well, maybe we can answer them without his input based on the additional information you've supplied.

Accident. This was the only time they were on.

You could probably answer this too with a little "hard recollection" - fast, sharp blips with no dimming or slowly pulsating? Can you visualize the blinking? I just read a fascinating article about people with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory:

Apparently even people with superb memories have trouble remembering things they haven't concentrated on. Just another nail in the coffin of the reliability of eye-witness testimony.

Not if they offer her immunity!

Yeah, I am sure that's the ticket.

I've read some scary stories about how bad the gas infrastructure is in the US and how many major gas pipelines are showing signs of failure from corrosion, ground movement and accidental punctures from earthmoving equipment.

That's a recipe for trouble if there ever was one . . .

[Robert Green]

Anyone know if there are approved LEDs that can be substituted.

Just recently I came across backup/reversing light replacements that have built in beepers. With just a simple bulb changeout my van now has backup beeping.

I'd consider replacing the flasher bulbs with LEDs if they met DOT specs because they *have* to last longer in emergencies. I'd be a little concerned that they might negatively impact the flasher module because of their different electrical profile.

[Robert Green]

Good point but I think DD's already established they were left on by accident since they were only flashing on one vehicle and they weren't flashing on previous nights.

[Robert Green]

It's much harder to sue a bay for negligence than it is to sue a construction company. (-: Sadly, I'll bet that at least one avaricious lawyer has already tried (to sue a body of water).

[Ed Pawlowski]

When I lived in Philadelphia in the earlyh 70's, I had a 1964 Karman Ghia. I did bring the battery in the house at night. I did not have a problem at work because I parked on a hill and could get rolling and pop the clutch.

[Robert Green]

would arrive, start the oil draining while he disconnected his battery, and bring both inside the building. He was so skilled at these tasks they hardly added any time to his commute.

warm battery, and start his car. Then often he'd jump the rest of us before he went home himself.

The Karman Ghia body design was as far ahead for it's time as the VW beetle wasn't. I'll bet that body style could easily be revived today - it really was a standout. Did you have the easy open (with a knife) ragtop, the hardshell removable top or the hardtop?

[TimR]

I like the line in Drive Angry. One of the disposable bad guys tells Nicholas Cage he's going to sacrifice the baby and live forever. Cage's line is "if by forever you mean the next 5 seconds, you're right." Then Cage kills him.

[TimR]

We lived in a small German town courtesy of the US Army.

Parked cars in some areas were required to have a taillight on all night. The German cars come with a low powered taillight and a separate switch. It easily works all night without draining the battery.

[DerbyDad03]

This has nothing to do with lights and batteries, but it is related in terms of cars, Germany and the US Military.

I lived on the resort island of Sylt, Germany courtesy of the USCG. I totaled a VW bug and it had to be disposed of. Since there was no junkyard on the island, it had to be transported off of the island on the auto-train. The metal and other salvageable parts were worth some money, so a local handyman volunteered to take it off my hands - and off the island - for nothing. I give him the car, he makes it disappear, we call it even.

We spent a full Saturday dismantling the bug and breaking it down into parts that one person could carry, except for the engine of course. When we were done, the entire car was put in the back of his tiny euro-style pick-up truck and driven off base.

3 decades later and I still miss that car.

[clare]

That really depends on the lights and the battery. Generally a cat will have a pretty heavy battery, and the cat will generally have only

2 lamps flashing. 35 watt flashersX2, with a 30% duty cycle would be 21 watts - if the cat is 12 volt, that is less than 2 amps - and a deisel starting battery is usually WELL OVER 200 amp hours - which would run that flasher for 100 hours.

My guess is the average cat crawler would still start in temperate weather after 10 hours with the flashers on if the battery was in decent shape - and quite possibly after 24 hours or more.

[clare]

Called a side light or "parking" light, generally energized by turning the signal lever to the "off side" with the key turned off - a

3 watt (more or less) lamp was lit.

[DerbyDad03]

...snip...

This Cat 420E had 6 lamps flashing. 2 front, 2 rear, 2 indicator lamp inside the cab.

[clare]

OK - at max, 35 watts for each of the outside 4, and 3 watts for the inside flasher - do the math. What does it have for batteries??? Likey a minimum of 2 large batteries of 400 plus amp hours each.

Now that we know WHAT cat you are talking about it gets easier. It uses a group31 880cca starting battery. Approxemately 150 AH capacity. The inside indicators will be led if it is a recent unit, so you can pretty well count those out of the equasion, and 1157 bulbs are 26 watts each. 104 watts X 33% is 34 watts average draw - aprox 3 amps.

Half of 150 ah would be 75 ah, or 25 hours of flasher duty to half charge.