Unfortunately we did not get to touch the car this week - major "honey do" lists for both me and my friend. Since I'm now at work and am racking my brain on this one, here's another recap of Friday's testing.
Solenoid has two heavy side connections and two smaller connections on top. Per the ProDesign book, I'm fairly sure the two small top connections are the ignition and starter? One of the heavy sides appears to be the ground? The other heavy side has three connections: (1) battery POS from the cutoff switch, (2) MSD 6A wire, and (3) the "culprit" wire in question that appears to go back through the firewall. I think the "culprit" wire is red/black ... but I am going by memory and could be wrong. The wire does have a connection in it about 6 inches off the solenoid and changes to a grey wire, so tracking it is a bit of a challenge.
Our testing on Friday night started with hooking a test light in line at the POS battery terminal. All testing was done with ignition in the off position. Here's the approach we took:
1) We disconnected everything on the solenoid - no test light.
2) Added the battery cable back - no test light.
3) Added the ground(?) back - no test light.
4) Added the two top wires back (starter and ignition?) one at a time - no test light.
5) Added the "culprit" wire back - test light.
6) Removed the "culprit" wire - no test light.
7) Added the MSD 6A wire back - no test light.
8) Added the "culprit" wire back again - test light
At this point, we think we have identified the "culprit" wire as the only drain. To test, we again removed everything from the solenoid and only hooked up the "culprit" wire and the test light came on. It was getting late, so we did a quick follow on the wire and it looks like it went through the firewall. Hopefully this week we'll get some evenings in working on it.
Jim: Thanks for the thoughts. We're definitely going to tackle this with a multimeter. Directions ... blasphemy!!
Poorboy: I don't have the ProDesign guide with me at work, but based on what I read last night I'm wondering if the "culprit" wire could be to the Ammeter with a connection back to the alternator. If so, that might pinpoint it to the Alternator?