Vacation - Battery disconnect ?

[JExpedition07]

Has been cranking over better every morning and have taken some long drives which likely have synced the new battery in good. One of the mornings it was zero degrees out even the brand new battery cranked over slower than usual. Battery was made in December according to the sticker....

Still a lot better than the old one which barely cranked over at all at zero and below.

 

[rjdelp7]

Check for a CD jam. I had a magazine trying to eject, with the key off. It drained the battery.

 

[jimz]

I had the CD changer running with key off until battery went dead. When I turned key off I made double sure CD/Radio turned off. I only keep one CD in now so nothing much to hunt for.

 

[JExpedition07]

Easy fix, there was a phone charger with an indicator light plugged in one of the 12V outlets.

 

[Plati]

Followup. I put the new battery in the 2003 on January 6 and new battery in 2014 on January 21. On Monday February 4 I decided to do a sanity check. I failed.

The 2014 was 12.6V resting , dropped to 10.7V starting , and 14.3V running.
The 2003 was 12.3V resting , dropped to 9.9V starting , and 14.5V running.

2003 battery was seemingly weaker/less charged so I put it on 6AMP charger and it was pulling 5A and saying 25% charged so I let that run for 6 hours until it dropped into good.

After driving it around all this week, it is holding up to more like the 2014 battery. Just for grins I put the charger back on it and it dropped to 100% charged & 2AMPS in 15 minutes.

Conclusion. I dunno. My guess is the 2003 battery (from AdvanceAuto) didn't come fully charged and never charged up fully with whatever driving I was doing. Maybe its a good idea to charge up a new battery when you buy one?

To be thorough, I just put the charger on the 2014. It dropped to 75% charged & 3AMPS in 10 minutes (which I think is ok?). I'll give it an hour or two to go to good. Can't hurt

Will do another sanity check in a few weeks.

 

[Bain64]

Hey MrSticker, as you discovered yes you should charge a new battery after purchase. They slowly discharge just sitting on the shelf. Glad you've got it all solved.

 

[1955moose]

Definition of insanity, doing the same thing, but expecting a different result! Back in my days at the motorcycle shop, we used to fill dry batteries with electrolyte, then put on our multi battery charger. It was 1 1/2 amps if memory serves me. We'd tell customer that was buying battery to return about 3-4 hours later. The battery voltage was good enough without charging, but it's what we did. All motorcycle shops pretty much adhere to this practice. I don't know if the slow charging stimulates the acid or something, and have never heard of any shop, or parts store recommending this procedure for automotive batteries. Can't see how it would hurt a new battery as long as you don't overcharge it. A 6 amp or smaller charger to get it above it's 12.6 resting voltage, say 13.0, should probably git er done!

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