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General Information => General => Topic started by: Smokey Eddy on July 07, 2011, 02:26:51 pm
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Any tips on getting a very dead battery to charge?
I was away for about 2 months and in that time almost 1 litre of water had evaporated from the battery so I topped it up but the battery only reads 0.65v and my charger won't start charging it.. should I jumper cable a charged battery to it for a while or what? I think its still under warranty but if its just an issue of juicing it with a charge I'd rather do that.
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Any tips on getting a very dead battery to charge?
I was away for about 2 months and in that time almost 1 litre of water had evaporated from the battery so I topped it up but the battery only reads 0.65v and my charger won't start charging it.. should I jumper cable a charged battery to it for a while or what? I think its still under warranty but if its just an issue of juicing it with a charge I'd rather do that.
did you add distilled water/sulfuric acid? or normal water?
usually when the plates go dry, they get oxidized, and are no good.. if that battery will come back, its gonna need a big charger to cook it for a few hours..
we used to have a 480 amp charger that did wonders to dead batteries.. it would make them boil in short order.
that batteries best chance is a big charger to cook some of the oxidation off the plates..
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If its still under warranty get it replaced, it will never be as good as it once was without work.
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Sounds like you have one of those !@#$%^ new fangeled "smart" chargers if I'm reading this right.. They won't charge a completely dead battery, just a low one... You can jumper it to another battery and let it charge a while till there's enough juice for it to charge on its own... AS Kevin mentioned though, the plates probably dried out, even cooking it with a big arsed charger is never going to bring it back to what it was..
X2 on If you can warrenty that bugger at no cost do it....
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The way we used to deal with these when I worked at an auto shop was to throw it on a charger that puts out a lot of amps, like one that has a crank assist function and "shock" it a few times, cycling between off and a high amp charge every few minutes. Then, place it on a slow trickle charge. I'm not exactly sure of the physics behind it but it seemed to work on very dead batteries.
And if you have a high-frequency battery charger that might help, they deliver high-frequecy, high(er) voltage pulses to the battery which knocks the sulfate compounds off the plates. If the plates were exposed to air, I think they would have instead oxidized and I'm not sure it would fix that.
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I don't think the plates got dry. What I did was set my older charger to 12 amps and connect my digital charger to the battery and zap the battery with the older charger until it held or at least saw 11v. Then at that time the digital charger kicked on and measuring with my multi meter I saw that the voltage would indeed rise and fall (as high as 15.5v) when on the "recondition" cycle. The amperage I kept at 12 for the first few minutes then set the digital charger to a setting intended for super dead batteries which is a trickle charge that slowly increases. Once I find the warranty paper ill see if I can trade it in.
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Isn't it nice that someone had the common sense to design a battery charger that won't charge a dead battery?? ;D I will say they are nice for maintaining a battery that sees little use.
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Well said :p
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Remember that the warranty is pro rata. That means every month it is worth a little less when doing an exchange or will cost you more to replace it. If it is an 84 month warranty and you paid 84 dollars for it then every month you have used it costs you a buck. So don't be surprised when the man hands you a new battery and a bill.
I do the shock and high amp charge with my charger. It hits them with 50 amps then cycle it to 10. Once the meter on the charger gets close to the 100% charged area I flip it down to 2 amps and it seems to drop the % down to 70 or so. Hours later the little yellow light is flashing and I take it off. Until the next time something goes wrong and drains it.
I purchased a new battery a few months ago and it drained pretty quick on me one weekend when I was fooling with the timing. Why do we do that stuff. I thought it odd that the new battery would do that so I took it back and the shop tested it, my alternator, and starter. When that was done he came back to the battery and found it to be much lower and draining outside his comfort level. He pulled it, gave me a bigger cranking amperage one and sent me on my way. No Charges leveled. They only do batteries, starters and alternators and the guy knew I was just there and he really likes the VW. Says something about high school days or something when I pulled in.
Any way, hope it all works out for you. Either getting the old one to juice up or a replacement for free.
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Thanks! It's a huge battery. Not original size at all. It's juicing up nicely now :)
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Any Clue why it went dead in the two months of non use? Seems like something was amiss. Leave the light on in the car so you could find it when you got back?
I have my radio wired direct so at times when I turn it down to talk to someone outside the car I forget to turn it all the way off. It makes a funny click noise when the glow plugs kick on and I know I left it on overnight. I have an Amp gauge that tells me I have juice going to the battery for longer than it should when I forget the radio overnight. Otherwise it snaps back to about 5 amps after a bit down the road from start up.
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My deck always has power yes. It is the culprit I'm quite sure.
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If it is an 84 month warranty and you paid 84 dollars for it then every month you have used it costs you a buck. So don't be surprised when the man hands you a new battery and a bill.
That's not exactly how it works. There is a free replacement period, usually between 1 and 2 years and after that the pro-rated period starts. Depending on how far into the pro-rata period you are, you might want to consider buying a new battery outright. This is because the warranty applies to the original sale date, so if you are on month 80 of month 84, you are paying most of the full cost of the battery for only a 4 month warranty. Of course, different battery might have different policies and individual shops do sometimes deviate from the warranty policy but this was how things were supposed to work when I sold batteries and I did not know of anyone else doing it differently.
Anyway, leaving any battery connected to the car's electrical system will eventually discharge (and possibly ruin it) if left for over a month or so as there are enough parasitic loads on the battery to do that (like the clock on your radio). Of course, it was low on it's fluid so that wouldn't help either but I really can't see how a liter of water evaporates out of a battery that fast considering it's regularly exposed to high underhood temperatures and you don't see that happening. Was it in direct sunlight?
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If it is an 84 month warranty and you paid 84 dollars for it then every month you have used it costs you a buck. So don't be surprised when the man hands you a new battery and a bill.
That's not exactly how it works. There is a free replacement period, usually between 1 and 2 years and after that the pro-rated period starts. Depending on how far into the pro-rata period you are, you might want to consider buying a new battery outright. This is because the warranty applies to the original sale date, so if you are on month 80 of month 84, you are paying most of the full cost of the battery for only a 4 month warranty. Of course, different battery might have different policies and individual shops do sometimes deviate from the warranty policy but this was how things were supposed to work when I sold batteries and I did not know of anyone else doing it differently.
Anyway, leaving any battery connected to the car's electrical system will eventually discharge (and possibly ruin it) if left for over a month or so as there are enough parasitic loads on the battery to do that (like the clock on your radio). Of course, it was low on it's fluid so that wouldn't help either but I really can't see how a liter of water evaporates out of a battery that fast considering it's regularly exposed to high underhood temperatures and you don't see that happening. Was it in direct sunlight?
if i leave a car siting, and its a runner, i always start/drive it atleast once a month to keep the battery charged, and to keep all the fluids flowing..
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It was in a cool dark garage. Shocked to find it still charging at 12 amps this afternoon and the battery its self hot and steaming. Topped it off with more distilled water. Charger still classifies it as being "low". I'm thinking I should add more acid to it.
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It was in a cool dark garage. Shocked to find it still charging at 12 amps this afternoon and the battery its self hot and steaming. Topped it off with more distilled water. Charger still classifies it as being "low". I'm thinking I should add more acid to it.
the battery is probably done for then.. my blue top optima does the same thing.. charge it for a couple days and it gets warm, holds a bit of charge, then the second you take it off the battery charger, it starts dropping volts, quickly..
besides, you said it yourself, the battery was low, thats no good right there.. usually once a battery gets low, its never the same..
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Is it possible that this thing was just mediocre (not filled up all the way) right from the time you bought it?
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No, I regularly would check it as I've always had charging problems. Slipping belt.
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Maybe I should read the fine print in some of the warranties. Like it was mentioned there is generally a period of time that goes by with a free replacement. But after that is pro rata for the value of the battery. Perhaps this is a new way to reduce the initial cost of some of these beasts. Marketing ploy. Cheaper initial dollar outlay but no replacement period given. In today's cut the cost of doing business i wouldn't put it past some manufacturers doing it this way.
When I worked in the battery business about 30 years ago the owner would take back a dead battery on the last day of the warranty free of charge. Not many took that route but he felt it was better for business to keep the customer satisfied then try and explain how the warranty really worked. It probably never cost him much in the long run.
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It seems to vary among manufacturers.. Oddly enough the cheaper the battery the better the chances it has one year free replacement... Walmart, Autozone, etc all have the free year as does the Dekka and it's other brands.. Motorcraft which IMO is a pretty darned good battery (whoever makes it) Is pro rated after I think 6 months.. Never had to return one of those either...
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Update!
the battery is completely useless. it doesn't hold a charge longer than an hour or so. I bought a new one.
Hopefully i'll find the warranty where ever it is. it's still covered - otherwise im out $127. Oh well. Edit: I bought a new one today.
HOWEVER I have an interesting query now... today driving from Abbotsford to Vancouver (in dismal traffic - almost 2 hours of crawling) my rad fan was on pretty much the entire time and got to a point where the relay wasn't getting enough juice to stay closed. Didn't come close to overheating thankfully but this raised an interesting theory. At this time the battery light came on and the irritating whine i hear through my speakers went away. Immediately i thought AW CRAP THAT V BELT BROKE!!! NNNNNNOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
but the water temp didn't rise at all... i quickly turn off all electronics now thinking that there is just something wrong with the alternator after being punished so brutally by driving with a useless dead battery that the alternator is struggling to try and charge. The whine i was hearing would change with the frequency of the rotation of the alternator - this lead me to believe there was no longer a current coming from the alternator.
I was driving to my brothers house for a BBQ, about another 20-30 minutes away. I continued on my merry way sweating buckets and creating ulcers.
To my astonishment, the car started up just find when i wanted to leave about 5 hours later. It is now night time.
Battery light comes on and off, and with this the headlights go off and then on - inversely to the battery light.
Im thinking now at this point that it's not alternator related anymore (somehow) and instead the dreaded "x" relay, which i've replaced last year, is acting up...
The battery light was on the whole way home, this time with no traffic so it was half the travel time thus being a 45 minute drive.
Headlights never dimmed and i started playing music (Its a 2800 watt system but i obviously wasn't blasting it) when i was 10 minutes away. i no longer noticed a dim of the lights on bass notes nor does the interior light pulsate like it used to.
this then lead my investigation to the voltage regulator in the alternator which i also replaced almost exactly a year ago.
What do you guys think? I've tried to be as detailed as possible.
its midnight, pitch black out and im tired otherwise, i'd throw the multi-meter on it and see what's going on but that's for tomorrow morning. The multi-meter will also only indicate what voltage the alternator is putting out but im equally interested in how many amps the alternator is capable of producing in it's old age. I've always wanted to replace it but its a moderately costly part to replace and if it aint broke...
Other than the red light of death in the dashboard and the lack of daytime running lights what ever has happened seems to be an improvement. it fixed the irritating interference coming through the speakers and the pulsating brightness of all the lights (an unfixed voltage).
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you got a bad ground somewhere buddy.. i would be looking at the negative cable.
my rabbit charge light never went out after i cooked the negative cable..
do you have double grounds? or any sort of supplementary grounds from the battery to the chassis? ground to the alt?
how do you have the stereo grounded? do you have the RCA cables and power wire running down the same side of the car?
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Okay, its charging at 14.21volts.
1 ground to tyranny-block bolt. One to the subframe of some sort, near the battery its self.
The alt should ground VIA its mounting bolt, block, ground cable. I used 2 ga welding wire.
There is also a ground, brown wire, coming from the dash to the neg terminal.
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I want to redo all my under hood electrical before winter this year..
Do overkill wires everywhere, and use die-electric grease liberally.
Along with a second battery if I can :)
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I just checked every ground I could find for resistance getting back to the battery and they're all perfect...
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I'm having a difficult time understanding this one. So you say I've cooked the ground. I tested the ground for the fan relay (the one I jumped) and it seems fine...
Why also did the interference go away and my running lights stop working? I'm going to check all the fuses.
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Ok so I fried the 30 amp radiator fan fuse. That makes sense. Wow that fan is 30 amps... Jesus. Is it ill advised to wire the relay with my own wires to the battery and skip the fuse?
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YES. Very ill. Do NOT run it without a fuse. You can run your own wiring but run a fuse.
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Anyone have any ideas about why the daytime running lights went out as well? The fuses are fine.
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If you get one with a 1-year free replacement, you can return it at 364 days each year, indefinitely...
Are you implying, to replace it whether or not it is defective? I think they test them to determine whether or not they will replace it for you.
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Do you guys have any input for my problem at hand? Is 14.2 volts too high? With the car off the battery sits at 15...
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I wouldn't be concerned with 14.2 on the car charging but 15 off the car is not normal that I know of.
I normally notice 14.5-13.5 after start up and the amp meter is at about 30. Once I get rolling it drops quick to 13.5 or 12.8 and 5 amps.
My guess is that the high demand on the fuse just took it out. Replace and keep a spare in case it happens again. If it does then go looking for troubles.
Whine in my car was there whenever the alternator revved up. I put on a suppressor on the radio hot wire. Problem all gone.
Some new batteries are not "fully charged" and you may be experiencing that effect. Put it on a home charger and stop making the alternator do the work. It may be on it's way out as well. There are plenty of shops that will test your alt, bat and starter for free. Use the service and thank them heartily.
Buy one battery and returning it on day 364 is just short of criminal behavior in my mind.
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FYI, Sam's Club has the 1 or 2 year free-replacement on their batteries and if you return the battery during that time the warranty time period is restarted. If you get one with a 1-year free replacement, you can return it at 364 days each year, indefinitely...
I have done the same thing
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Just read through this quick...
The whine from your speakers could be due to a failed diode in the alternator. The alternator can still charge with one bad diode...I recommend getting a shop to check the charge output with an oscilliscope.
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If the whine is from a bad diode why did it go away...
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They do not check them. They replace it with a new battery, no questions asked, and give you a new updated receipt that renews the warranty back to the full warranty period.
Oh, I was unaware they didn't check them at that particular store. I know at Canadian Tire they check them before any warranty is fulfilled.
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They do not check them. They replace it with a new battery, no questions asked, and give you a new updated receipt that renews the warranty back to the full warranty period.
Oh, I was unaware they didn't check them at that particular store. I know at Canadian Tire they check them before any warranty is fulfilled.
THe thing is, they don;t check them very well.. Throw the tester on.. If it's low they replace it.. So just made darned sure it's dead before you take it in.. There used to be a vendor for I think it was titan batteries here.. Very good batteries btw.. They required a charge for so long at so many amps and be tested before replacement..
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They do not check them. They replace it with a new battery, no questions asked,
Both true,In my case 100 ah new has only 45 ah real by my check.Shp check said OK of corse,and here don`t change easy.If you interested I`ll tell how to.
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So I drove 800km today during which the light went out but now flickers
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Resistance tests are pretty close to 100% useless for identifying bad grounds. You need to do a voltage drop test. It's in the FAQ on how to do it.