When to change battery>

Status
Not open for further replies.
Joined
Dec 30, 2012
Messages
1,928
Location
Southwest
Got the Ford "Works" package where they change your oil rotate your tires and check your battery and brakes. Anyway, the man came back and said my battery had 343 CCA down from 750 CCAand that I would probably have to change it in about six months. Car is not quite 2.5 years old. Apparently Ford has a protocol and the battery is "green" so they won't recommend changing. My assumption is that they will press for a change way before its necessary. On the other hand, if their standards are too strict they have to do a bunch of warranty replacements. My inclination is to replace it in December, but be poised to replace it at the drop of a hat if it cranks a little slow.


Should I change it now, change at a hair-trigger, or defer for another six months?

I'm kind of a 6K OCI guy rather than a 3K OCI guy if you know what I mean. If it makes any difference, I have almost no power options on the car.

While I have your attention, AGM or plain?
 
Last edited:
I had a Mopar battery go bad (w/o warning) at 2 1/2 years. I replace my batteries with regular Deka. Nothing fancy. You might want to get a second opinion at an auto parts store.
 
Last edited:
Get a real test at an auto parts store. Advance auto will tell you voltage too, your battery might just not be staying fully charged if it's a short tripper.

My brand new autocraft gold was testing in the 460 amp range after one winter, but rated for 770. Test indicated low voltage. I pulled it out and charged it at 5 amps and took it back to retest and it's at 700. State of charge is very important to cca, you shouldn't need to replace it until the day you require a Jumpstart.

If you don't have a charger, invest in one. Any automatic charger will do you don't need much maybe 2-6 amps. Anything over 15 amps is a little rougher for maintaining, but good for charging dead batteries faster.

The charger I have now is a Diehard dh15a. 2/10/15 amp. About $40 at Meijer.
 
Agree with putting a charge on it and retesting.

We replace ours in the Jeep at 3.5 years since it tends to be done at 4.
 
New Mexico... Hot, right? Degrading chemical reactions double very 8C above 25Celsius.

Ever run it down?

Ever charge it fully with a real and smart charger?

To get the best read, charge it with a smart charger slowly, then have a real place test it with a combination of capacitance and real resistive load.
 
2 Amp hour charge for a battery is what I do.

I replace as soon as it cranks slowly.
 
I don't trust any battery tester to give an accurate CCA remaining rating. The results can vary even wider depending on whether the place doing the testing can profit from selling you another battery, or profit by denying warranty claims.

I agree with fully charging your current battery. Most people act like the alternator is an instant magical battery charger but the fact is that it does a poor job returning a battery at 80% state of charge to 100%. Hours and hours of charging are needed to go from 80% to 100% no matter the charging source, and the closer the battery lives to 100%, the longer it should last.

So after any time playing the radio with the engine off or any other fairly significant battery depletion, the owner would be wise to use a plug in charger to bring the battery back to or near 100% and not just rely on the 'magical' alternator to do so, on their short trip to the store and back.

I've found some batteries that lived their whole life in the 85% range responded better, when discharged to ~ 50% then promptly recharged at a 25% rate of the 20 hour rate of amp hour capacity.

I am not a believer in the low and slow "trickle" mentality being best. I've taken Sg readings of such a charged battery and found them reading very low where as an automatic charger which holds mid 14's for several hours does much better.

Anyway Lead acid battery myths are likely to never die, as long as we use lead acid batteries.

In the OP's case, I would recommend doing a full charge monthly with a grid powered charger, and consider replacement come winter. At the minimum carry jumper cables, or a fully charged jumper pack when it does get cold again.

I have found my Northstar AGM battery to be impressive in terms of cranking power and voltage held under a longer slower discharge. But it is a very pricey and heavy battery and the extreme cranking power and higher voltage when discharging might not mean squat in the long run. Bragging rights only, perhaps.

Sears Platinum batteries are rebadged Odyssey batteries. They want huge recharging rates when deeply cycled. Just any plug in charger will not allow this battery to perform to its max potential, when cycled deeply. Users of these batteries, in deep cycle applications, need to be aware of this requirement and not just rely on reputation and a high price tag to reap the possible benefits of AGM over the much cheaper flooded starting battery options.

If an Odyssey battery owner every needs a jumpstart, they really need to find a charger that can feed a 100 amp hour battery 40 amps, until 14.7v is reached, then hold that 14.7v for 4 hours while the amps required to hold 14.7 taper toward zero. Not doing this, is dooming an expensive battery to an early demise, though it would likely still outlive a flooded battery given the same treatment.
 
The 14.1 charging rate on the Bosch alternators condemns a battery to a slow death. It isn't really capable of charging a low battery. But the alternators lasts for 100s of K miles and decades of use , so its not worth messing with that. I often play the radio when working in the yard.If the battery wont start afterward, start cruising for deal When I forget something and flatten the battery, I recharge it for 8 hrs @ 2 amps. The Rat's tiny little battery will run flat if I dont drive the truck once every 2 weeks. When I remember, I top it off with the 1 amp float maintainer, I got from Harbor Fright. The Rat starts very easily. I have even pop started it in reverse
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
New Mexico... Hot, right? Degrading chemical reactions double very 8C above 25Celsius.

Ever run it down?

Ever charge it fully with a real and smart charger?

To get the best read, charge it with a smart charger slowly, then have a real place test it with a combination of capacitance and real resistive load.


If battery A in New Mexico is on average kept ten degree Celsius (18 degree Fahrenheit) hotter than battery B in Florida, then battery A can be expected to last half as long as battery B.

And yes a battery can fail without warning. And batteries can even fail while the car is running resulting in a stalled engine. So if you ever drive through locations where a battery failure may leave you stranded in an environment that is too hot to be safely stranded in, it would be wise to replace your battery early such as every 24 months.
 
My 2012 Rogues battery died with no warning at all. Died in a grocery store parking lot. Thankfully someone heard the car trying to start and gave me a jump. I replaced with a Deka. Im in Florida so the heat killed it too im sure. The guy that I bought the Deka from said he sees a lot of cars come in that are only 2 to 3 yrs old. So if I was you....I would get it tested by a 2ndpl ace and replace if its specs are low. I don't get stretching out the life of a battery if needed and risk getting stuck at the worst place at the worst time. JMO
 
I've always replaced when they failed to start the car. Why replace before then? Usually I can get by with a jump or two, then I figure out that it's the battery.

NM, it's pretty warm there, so might be normal lifespan. If you don't want to deal with a no-start, might be worth the expense. I've not had issues where the battery has been an issue--that said, in the wife's car, I had it replaced at 7 years *before* it had a no-start. It was worth it to me to have it done before it had problems.
 
Originally Posted By: JimPghPA
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
New Mexico... Hot, right? Degrading chemical reactions double very 8C above 25Celsius.

Ever run it down?

Ever charge it fully with a real and smart charger?

To get the best read, charge it with a smart charger slowly, then have a real place test it with a combination of capacitance and real resistive load.


If battery A in New Mexico is on average kept ten degree Celsius (18 degree Fahrenheit) hotter than battery B in Florida, then battery A can be expected to last half as long as battery B.

And yes a battery can fail without warning. And batteries can even fail while the car is running resulting in a stalled engine. So if you ever drive through locations where a battery failure may leave you stranded in an environment that is too hot to be safely stranded in, it would be wise to replace your battery early such as every 24 months.


BTW a vehicle that spends any significant portion of its life in an underground garage where the temperature is significantly cooler, can be expected to have a longer battery life than a similar vehicle with a similar battery that spends significantly more time in the same area but in the hotter environment outside of the underground garage. And the owner of a vehicle that spends most of its life in cool underground garages may brag about the long life they get from a battery without giving credit to the significantly cooler average temperature that their vehicle (and battery) are normally kept at.
 
In my experience I've noted that regardless of the brand of battery they all can go bad anytime even though it may only have a few years. In you case I'd have your battery put on the charger and re-charge it to it's fullest. If it continues to hold a charge just try and keep it another 6 months and ditch it right away.

Durango
 
I pulled the battery out of my Buick last night inspired by this thread which re hashed my ocd and my charger indicted 80% state of charge. (DH-15A charger on 1.5 yr old Autocraft Gold 78-2)
It seems my battery and alternator combo keep it around 80% in the warmer months and even lesser in the summer when I'm constantly using heat and rear defrost. Something like 60%-70% in the winter iirc.

I pull it out every couple of months just to charge it at 2 amps. I think last night it took over 5 hours at 2 amps before indicating full. All this while my alternator tests perfect on the AAP tester.
 
Originally Posted By: supton
I've always replaced when they failed to start the car. Why replace before then? Usually I can get by with a jump or two, then I figure out that it's the battery.

NM, it's pretty warm there, so might be normal lifespan. If you don't want to deal with a no-start, might be worth the expense. I've not had issues where the battery has been an issue--that said, in the wife's car, I had it replaced at 7 years *before* it had a no-start. It was worth it to me to have it done before it had problems.


Why replace it early? Because I'm lending my car to my daughter for the summer. Besides, the battery is chronically the weak link in any car--the one thing most likely to leave you stranded. So its worthwhile keeping on top of it. I found an old battery tester in the garage, something I bought in the 1980's. You press the button for ten seconds it warms up a toaster wire and you read the meter. It was about halfway in the green for what its worth.

I'll test it again before she leaves, and maybe even show her how to work the tester. I figure at almost 2.5 years old and the battery not being 'perfect' it won't hurt to test every couple of months and keep an eye on things. Daughter has never owned her own car, so part of the deal of loaning it to her is showing her the nuances of maintenance. She asked me to show her how to jumpstart a car, so I'll do that, too. This stuff will be invaluable to her when she graduates into a world of basement apartments.

By the way, Ford seemed to have the bet all around deal, with $120 Motorcraft batteries with 48 month free replacement (and some big chunk of pro rata after that). I was kind of surprised at the cost of battery chrgers. They were $30 even at Harbor Freight.

Maybe I'll get one of those el cheapo trickle chargers as suggested. I drive the car nearly every day, but for shot distances, sometimes without driving more than 20 minutes at a time If I remember to put it on a trickle charger even once a week, that might be helpful.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom