2001 Camry battery dead in three days

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Sometimes alarm systems can be a real PITA. I did a Ford one time that would run the battery down once in a while in a few days for no apparent reason, disconnecting the fully charged battery showed the battery would hold the charge so battery eliminated, the charging system was fine and current draw low.
On night about 2AM i went into the garage and found the running board lights on then they went off. When it got cold or rained the door key pad would act up after some time and light the running boards. A new key pad took care of it once and for all.
 
Sometimes an alarm will go off when the battery voltage drops below a certain value, so while the alarm may have gone off in the past, it might of been tripped because something else was going on causing the voltage to drop below normal values.
 
Defined "so I charged it"

Does this mean you took it on the freeway for a 20 mile round trip, or that you used a plug in charging source of at least 6 amps, and left it applied for at least 12 hours?


Any time a battery rests at less than 80% charged, the sulfates on the plates are hardening. The lower the battery state of charge is, and the longer it rests there, The harder they get and it becomes less and less likely that charging voltages will ever redissolve them back into the electrolyte, no matter how high they go or how long they are held there. Sulfation = capacity loss/ performance loss/ CCA loss, and hardened sulfation is not easily dissolved, ever, even if one really wants to believe the marketing material provided by modern charging sources which claim to defy physics, and then fellate the user afterwards too.

I have had several severely capacity compromised batteries which would still pass a load test. I personally do not trust any load test that does not ask the battery to produce half the CCA rating for 30 seconds and still hold over 7.5 volts.

The battery could be toast, even if only a year old. Easiest way to kill a battery is to let is discharge slowly, and then sit in an undercharged state for an extended period of time. When this is done the Age of the battery means very little. It can be killed nearly as easily as an older battery, an no simply recharging it does not make it right again. The 30 gallon gas tank has shrunk to 5 gallons, never to expand again.

And the alternaotr is not some physics defying instant battery charger. A battery drained to 80% state of charge cannot be recharged to 100% in less than 3.5 hours, and those 3.5 hours would be when the battery is held it ideal absorption voltages.

Ideal absorption voltages are NEVER held by any vehicles voltage regulator, so in reality those 3.5 hours required to go from 80% to 100% are doubled or tripled at 13.7v, and it is debateable whether 150 hours at 13.7v can ever fully recharge a less than healthy battery to 100%.
 
Hey Bullet,

my dads cr-v was causing him similar pain.

I had so much on my plate over the holidays, i threw a "priority start" on it to get him thru until i could look at it properly. Plus its an hour each way for me.

Its working so well, he told me to just leave as is... just has to reset clock if it kicks in.

Just throwin' it out there, brother. $100 and everybody's happy.
 
Originally Posted By: oily boyd
Hey Bullet,
my dads cr-v was causing him similar pain.

I had so much on my plate over the holidays, i threw a "priority start" on it to get him thru until i could look at it properly. Plus its an hour each way for me.



Interesting product
 
Update: Since I charged the battery three weeks ago I pulled the plug from the alarm control module. I waited five days and started fine and shut off. Three more days started right up and shut off in a few seconds. Today started fine.

I guess some how the alarm was pulling the battery down after it was shut down for some time as it would only pull 30 milli amps when I was checking.

Next I'm going to change all the fluids and the timing belt. This was my 83 year old mother's car which she bought new in 2001. As strange as it sounds it has 30k miles, and up until 11/2015 after breaking an ankle, it was a daily driver or every other day. Last month she bought another new Camry as she wanted the confidence and secure feeling of a new car. My nephew will probably end with old car.
 
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