Please, Any Ideas About This Odd Electrical Problem?

[gonebuggy]

2000 bug, 2.0 , 90,000 miles and never had a serious problem. I tried to start it and the battery was stone dead. (twice in the past 3yrs the radio has stayed on after I pulled out the key and it ran the battery down. I assumed that was what happened. No big deal.) I charged the battery overnight. It started right up the next day, but now the cruise control is dead, the a/c doesn't work and I have to warm it up for a minute or it will stall backing out of the driveway. This freaks me out as I had intended to sell it very soon. I just checked the fuses and they are all OK. I even swapped some around in case one looked good but wasn't. They are really OK. If you have any thoughts or ideas I would love to hear them. Thank you for your time.

[D2Beetle]

If you pull the key out and the radio does not go off that is an indication of a bad ignition switch. You might want to replace it before you start diagnosing some of your other issues.

[mrathell]

Originally Posted by D2Beetle

If you pull the key out and the radio does not go off that is an indication of a bad ignition switch. You might want to replace it before you start diagnosing some of your other issues.

Really???? I always just assumed it was a weird Beetle design. My radio has always stayed on after the ignition was turned off and the ket removed. I always simply just pushed the on/off button on the radio to turn it off.

Is it a major? Or can I just leave it this way? Could it be also causing other issues or CEL codes?

Sorry about the thread jumping!

[gonebuggy]

Yeah, I figured the radio was an ignition problem, but it is such an extremely rare occurance I am not concerned about it. It happened the day Ike hit us (9-12-08) and left me stranded in a mandatory evacuation zone, real nice. Now it happens almost two years later, a week before I planned to sell the car. So it's rare, butcha gotta give it points for timing.

[D2Beetle]

I'm not certain what other components are powered on with the key in the ignition; so I'm not certain how detrimental it would be to leave it as is.