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This exactly. I don't think hydraulic usually fails from a sudden catastrophic failure. A slow leak and lowering is usually what happens.

Get a battery tester and check the condition regularly. Batteries usually don't just fail out of the blue. If the winters get to - 20C or below where you are, I'd probably replace the battery when it gets to 70% of the CCA rating. In more tempered climates I'd have no issue running a battery...

I get it, but IMO we don't really have any substantial data in terms of battery selection flooded/AGM/EFB and longevity. eg. if a flooded only lasts 2 years in the system but you can get 4 years from an EFB which only costs 50% more...then there could be a case that economically you may as well...

Yes, absolutely. If I owned a truck or 4x4 that I take offroad and had to replace the joints, I would choose metal-on-metal for things like tie rods and ball joints. Because I know where all the grease points will be and I'd be hitting it on every oil change. I also tend to keep vehicles for a...

I'm curious why the tech would recommend using a flooded, wouldn't that just die faster? I'd think an EFB would last longer in this application, but then again here in Canada EFB's are hard to source and even AGMs can be over 50% more expensive than flooded. I got my '24 Outlander used at 1...

I made a post about this strange behavior since I picked up a 24 Outlander (same as Nissan Rogue). I believe what is happening is all these modern vehicles (including Ford) are using variable voltage charging systems in an aggressive manner to save fuel. They deliberately keep extra room in the...

Did some more testing and pulling the connector from the negative battery terminal seems to keep the system at 14.2 - 14.5V, but on deceleration and braking it will still go to 15V. So I wonder what's the lesser of two evils: 1. Leave it the way the engineers designed it, with the EFB battery...

With the way things get rebranded nowadays, I'm not entirely sure brand even matters because you don't know who really manufactured it. eg. On a Ford thermostat gasket, there's an "improved" version of which both the Fel-Pro and Mahle product effectively have the same design but they colored the...

Depends on type of battery. Typically AGM don't like higher voltages because the excess gassing may pop the relief valve and you lose water over time. Flooded batteries are quite tolerant and the occasional high voltage is good for desulfating. Also known as an equalizing charge. On batteries...

It really depends on the vehicle. On modern vehicles, often times the 15 - 16V voltage spike is a designed feature acting as a pseudo regen braking by using the alternator to capture energy to the battery. Using a lithium battery with it's own BMS is a bad idea because the battery might cut...

So I put a plug in voltmeter to monitor things and here's what I noticed: Cold start, idle, no load: 12.0 - 12.3 V Cold start, idle, with load (HVAC fan, lights, heated seats on): 12.8 V Accelerating or normal driving: 13.9 V Decelerating or braking: 14.9 V Warm engine, idle or park: 13.9 V So...

Have you measured the voltage before and after? I wonder if disabling this would result in overcharging. Flooded is more tolerant than AGM to this, but I would take having to add water once in a while over undercharging.

I've always found the drive wheels to wear the fastest, on both FWD and RWD. For RWD, this was the case with both my Ranger truck and Genesis Coupe. The truck has a light rear end and the coupe is supposed to be closer to 50-50 weight distribution. With the coupe, the wheels are staggered so I...

Learned something new today. I looked at the pulley and you're right it does look like there is a sprag clutch assembly. Does not appear to be any other electronically controlled clutch. This probably isn't what's causing the issue though. Starting to feel like there really isn't anything I can...

Wow, an entire clutch on the alternator? That just seems like one extra part that will eventually wear out and fail. These silly designs to save fuel are just silly now because you're not really saving money in the long term when you inevitably have to diagnose or replace these parts. There's...

Doing some more reading, this seems to be a chronic problem with Nissans. I isolated the battery on it's own to verify that it does test properly and in fact holds a resting charge >12.7V just fine on its own. It's just that when it's hooked up to the car that it seems to stay perpetually...

Get a dye test kit to check for leaks.

IMO, small local shops are going to be hit and miss. They know it's a price competitive business and doesn't make sense to stock or source OE quality parts. Often times it may not even be possible to source OE parts like regulators. So most likely they're getting the cheapest Chinese equivalent...

Little bit of anecdotal evidence here, but I've messed around with various desulfators and battery chargers with desulfators. They have varying levels of success, but only very minor. The best way I've found to desulfate batteries is simply to make sure the water is topped up, then hook up the...

Napa sells CV boots with a lifetime warranty. But of course, they are made from neoprene, so like clockwork they start failing after 1-2 years. Before I sold the vehicle, I had probably warrantied them 4-5 times. I had tried other brands too like EMPI, but same problem. It was almost not worth...