Weird Voltage Issue

[SwampSurvivor]

I'm pretty sure the battery shorted out. My battery charger was NOT happy attempting to charge it. It dropped to 9 or so with the head lights on. It also killed the interior lights when I did that.

I think it was just a shorted battery.

14.4 is perfectly normal for this. But when the issue happened Friday night, the volt meter was pegged all the way to the right.

If I am able to throw an almost discharged battery on and it works completely normal again - maintaining 14.4 volts with a high load and recharging a low battery, but then immediately exhibits the same problems with the original battery (that has more voltage), i think it is the battery.

The focus is "due" for a battery replacement. I am going to buy a new battery for the Focus and throw that one in the Jeep. I won't be driving it much in the winter anyway and in the spring I'll buy the correct battery ... if not one with higher capacity.

 

[wrcsixeight]

I once had a battery fail in a strange manner. It would hold 12.6v, but with a small load on it it would drop to 10.2v and with load removed it would bounce back to 12.6v.

If I did not have a voltmeter on the battery directly when I applied a 16 amp load from a 12v air compressor, it would have been difficult to figure out.

Starting batteries do very poorly when drained completely dead. For them to survive they need to be charged back to 100% ASAP.

A Lead acid battery cannot be fully charged in less than 5 hours when drained completely. 5 hours is only possible with a high amp charger than can hold 14.5ish volts for the final 4 hours.

Far too many people think their 120 amp alternator can charge a battery in 15 minutes. It does not matter the claims of a chromed alternator, it takes time held at absorption voltage for a battery to reach full charge.

If only Lead acid batteries accommodated could be recharged completely in 15 minutes, there would be no energy storage problems in the world.

The OEM dashboard voltmeter is not trustworthy. On some vehicles it is dang near useless as one cannot discern the difference between 12 and 14.5 volts.

I believe the 2000 Jeeps still have issues with the ECM/PCM connectors breaking solder contacts on the circuit board. My '89 dodge had this issue. I had to open it up and reflow the solder. 4 of the 14 pins on one connector were compromised, one of these was the green wire from the alternator field terminals, and this caused wacky charging when it decided it was the most important time to screw with my sanity. The other 3 wires caused random stalling and a no restart.

Get some Caig Deoxit d5 spray for the ECM connectors, any connector really.

 

[SwampSurvivor]

The strange thing is, the battery was working fine all day.