2004 Ford Ranger Battery Drain
 

Found my newly purchased used 04 Ranger to take the battery down in 2-3 days. Did the old test light trick by detaching the neg. lead off the battery ,placing the clamp end of the light on the disconnected lead and clamping the point end of the light to the neg. batt. terminal with a vise grip.Found a fairly bright test light.Checked my 99 Ranger that doesn't have a batt. drain problem and the test light showed a much dimmer light.The put the test light back on the 04 Ranger as fore described and started pulling Relays and Fuses one by one looking for a change in brightness of light.Finally inside the pass.compartment fuse box I found fuse #33 Instrument Cluster changed the brightness of the light.So next I pulled the plastic panel off that goes below the steering column and next the metal plate. Once I got these items out of the way I found a weird electric device with lights and antenna cables coming out of it that did not appear to be OEM. Come to find out it was a GPS tracking device for Fleet management etc. that I quickly cut out and taped up all power leads going to this device.Went to Sears next and bought a DC electronic Ammeter to see how much this device was drawing. Disconnected from the truck this device on it's own was drawing .19 of an amp!Needless to say Problem is now fixed!;) All modern vehicles will draw a little bit clock and computer memory etc. But that draw in conjuction with the vehicles normal draw was just too much.Now all my future used vehicles will be checked prior to buying them with my new trusty $60 Craftsman DC Ammeter! Hopes this might help someone else PTC...

Good move, well done, thanks for the tip and info. Most if not all vehicles now have the module in them that will provide info in the event of a crash. Not too many people are aware the modules are in their vehicles. Drive carefully!