Battery Drain

Hello everyone!

I'm a recently new user to z31performance but I have spent a lot of time on other car forums as well as this one. Rule #1 ALWAYS check for related posts before submitting one. I know for a fact there are A LOT of battery drain posts out there that I have gone through and will do so again to see if I'm missing anything. Some are not the same as mine and some are similar but I never saw a resolution to the post. There may be one that is identical to mine and if you know about, please do not hesitate to direct me in that direction so I don't take anyone's time away. I plan to at least comment when I have a definitive direction I feel comfortable with and will post a comment of the resolution and process so anyone else can use it as well.

Let me go ahead and get started by saying I bought my first project car that's a 1985 N/A 300zx T Top. So far I love it. Specially with the infinite amount of problems I've been discovering over the past month or so. A little bit of sarcasm with a touch of excitement knowing that ill be proud of where it'll be when I'm done and all the work ill put into it. The beginner mechanical issues I want to address before anything slightly stacked up fairly quickly.
1. Needs a new Rack and Pinion (Really Bad)
2. Stiff Brakes
3. Soft clutch
4. Bad gauges
5. Some sort of Battery Drain*

The battery drain is where I'm having a little bit of difficulty and this is where I need a little bit of guidance. Ill try to be quick and simple for an easy read but I also want to be thorough for anyone willing to help out in order to keep things efficient and less time consuming for anyone. I do want to say thank you in advance. This is my first post so any suggestion are great.


Issue:
Almost* any time I start my Z the battery is dead. (* = as long as its been at least a couple days. 2nd+ start of the day it'll work fine almost all the time. MAYBE the next day it'll start as well.)



If I jump it and sit there in the car, the battery will drain rather quickly. Driving around will help charge it up after about 10 minutes or so and ill be able to turn it off and back on again during that day or maybe the next. If I turn on the AC while driving I car hear the Z take the struggle bus downtown and try and stay alive as best as it can and you can see on the Volt meter that its struggling as well. Now, I've been watching the vehicle at night and checking up on it trying to catch it in the act. and I've been successful. Every now and then the headlight will turn on with out anyone actually flipping the switch to do so. This could easily be a cause for the drain.

Now, after going through threads, manuals, testing, etc. It's come down to a few obvious issues.
1. Alternator
2. Battery
3. Parasitic Drain
4. Short somewhere

The battery should not be an issue. I tested it and made sure were good on cells. My mechanic chose to also change the battery after I told him the issue and informed him not to change the battery cause it will still die by the next morning and that it'll be better to see what causing it to drain. Guess who paid for a new battery anyways? This guy. Guess who's car was still dead in the morning and shocked the mechanic? This guy. Guess who isn't my mechanic? My old mechanic who I've only gone to once and after him having my Z for about 3 or 4 weeks to check 4 or 5 different issues. Two of which he could have been consistently proactive about but did absolutely nothing only change the battery..... I'm pretty upset about it still as you can tell.

The Alternator I'm leaning on entirely and once I move into my new home at the beginning of May I plan to take it out and have it tested by Auto Zone or some place reliable. If its bad, it'll be replaced but there will still be some form of drain somewhere. Bare minimum, the head lights. But this will most likely solve it have issues charging the vehicle and keeping it charged.

The parasitic drain I have read up on it when I first got the car as if it was something VERY common, however, recently I've been struggling trying to find relatable forum posts to assist me.

Recently, I read a comment regarding almost the exact same issue where someone commented a possible short somewhere but never said a resolution or a verification that its a possibility to think about.



So! Finally to end my novel here, I'm looking for guidance. I don't plan on buying anything until I can trouble shoot further so where and how should I start? The alternator is planned out and ready to execute once I move, but the Parasitic drain and the short being a possibility has never been something I have personally experienced, nor worked on. So, if its reasonable to test for those, how would I?

The other portion are the headlights. I know it will drain my battery but that does not necessarily mean it will cause my Z to struggle all the time while driving and so forth so I'm understanding now that its not just ONE issue, but more so the possibility of TWO issues related to each other.



Thank you to anyone who has taken to time to read this huge post, as well as those who are willing to guide me in the right direction. Any links to other posts are more than welcomed as you know. As promised, ill keep my end up and make sure I end the post with a comment stating the direction I'm going, troubleshooting process, as well as a final result so if anyone stumbles upon this post in the future they can use it for direction as well. Thank you - Oliver