Thread: car wont start

My car won't start. It seems like my battery is totally drained, because my lights don't turn on. I called AAA and had them come out to give me a jump, and when the mechanic attached his battery booster to my battery, the negative battery terminal started to arch. So we disconnected the battery boosted. We then tested the battery with a voltmeter, and the battery was at like .01 volts. So we then disconnected the wires from the terminal, and then tested the battery with the voltmeter and it showed 8volts. We reconnected the positive wires to the battery, and the voltmeter showed 8volts. When we reconnected the negative wire to the battery, the voltage on the voltmeter dropped from 8volts down to .01volts.

It seems like something is drawing power of the battery, but what could it be. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Shorted cells in a battery can cause the voltage to completely drop even under the lightest of loads.
hook a jump box up to the battery cables without the battery in the loop and see what happens.

Rob tried that too, and sparks started coming from the ground connection. Any other suggestions.

If it sounds like it wants to start but wont its your battery,if you turn the key and you hear nothing it 7-10 could be the starter,if your car is a manual (stick) try to do a rolling start it should turn over.I the past i had a dead starter in my NX i paid $200 for the tow truck to have the bend my rear control arm,It happened to me the other day when i bought my sentra and i fixed it with a few bump starts it never gave me a problem since!!

try disconnecting the alternator and then the starter to see if it makes a change. Sometimes an alt can go bad and start drawing current even when nothings on.