r4808n

A couple weeks ago I came out to my garage to a dead 2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT. I was going to leave for work in the morning and the remote doors would not unlock or respond. I opened the door with the physical key ... and no internal lights came on and start button would not respond. All I got was a faint light on the gear shifter and dashboard very faintly showed the P-R-N-D ... nothing else. Oddly enough ... the power seats still could be adjusted.

All behaviors indicated to me a dead battery ... odd considering I drove it just 12 hours earlier. So whatever drained it must be pulling on it hard!

I tried to jump it from my other vehicle. That did not work.

I tried to jump it from a jump pack. That did not work.

I tried to charge the battery from the wall on a charger. That would not work.
(Wouldn't even accept a charge)

I called Jeep Roadside for a tow. The first truck they sent was a flat bed ... and he could not get the vehicle into neutral to tow it out of the garage. (Electronic gear shift wouldn't shift ... no power.) He also tried jumping it from his jump pack ... no luck. Then he tried jumping it from his truck ... no luck. He told me to call back to Jeep Roadside and ask them to send a truck with a dolly system to pull it out of the garage.

Called Jeep back and they sent the correct truck to tow it in for service.

Service Manager called me the next day and said it was a defective battery and they had to replace it and I was all good. I picked it up and drove it all week and weekend with no problem. I come out on the next Monday morning ... dead again.

Exact same symptoms as before.

I tried to jump it from my other vehicle. That did not work.

I tried to jump it from a jump pack. That did not work.

I tried to charge the battery from the wall on a charger. That would not work.
(Wouldn't even accept a charge)

I called Jeep Roadside again ... at least this time knowing what type of tow truck to ask for. They came and got it back to Jeep.

I got a call from the Service Manager the next day that they battery they replaced the first time had a bad cell. He said it happens from time to time and they switched it out with another battery. I asked about drain and he ensured me a draw test was performed and nothing else was pulling power from the battery when it was off.

I drove it for the rest of the week and then had to go out of town on Thursday. When I returned on Sunday ... guess what? It wouldn't start again. This time I had a friend who was able to jump it. The second he connected the cables from the Jeep to his truck the headlights came on on the Jeep and the interior lights as well. The Jeep dashboard lit up with an "Accessory On" Warning. After sitting for a few minutes connected to his GMC it started right up.

I drove it for a bit and then connected to a trickle charger overnight to get the battery up to 100%. Drove it the next day to and from work (Monday) and plugged it up to the trickle charger when I got home just to see ... and it was down to 95% charged. Out of curiosity ... I unplugged it and let it sit for an hour and a half. Went back out and plugged in the trickle charger ... and it was down to 85% ... so a 10% drop in an hour. Clearly there is another issue at play here ... and clearly Jeep did not perform a draw test and were just knocking out quick fixes.

I charged it up overnight ... and drove it in to the dealer so they could do some more investigating on it. I left it there on Tuesday. It is Friday now and the Service Manager just called me to tell me that it was a defective/faulty driver-side door sensor causing the draw when the vehicle was off. The tech DID NOT have the key fob on him and when walking by the door, the dashboard lit up. I verified with the Service Manager that the tech did in fact trace it back thru the wiring and identified that the door sensor was faulty. New handle was ordered and would be in on Monday to be repaired. After that assured all will be good.

This all seems odd to me ... Could a door handle really be causing all of that? Why would the draw test they performed not show that ... or not trigger some sort of error code? What else would cause that sort of drain without showing up on a draw test?

Really not happy with the level of service to this point with Jeep. Was in market for the Trackhawk ... but definitely reconsidering now.