Hello all,

A while ago during my midterms period I let the car sit in the garage for a week because I was studying and then when I went to start it up to go to school for my exam it wouldn't start. I figured it was the battery because the electrical components were not working, and when I got home that day I tried boosting the car with another battery but that didn't work, then I just charged the battery with a charger and it started right up. I asked a few of my friends and they said it was normal, so I made nothing of it.

Now, just today, when I went to start up my car to put it away for winter, again it wouldn't start (my car had been again sitting in my garage for 5-6 days). Again I had to stop by the garage to pick up the charger.

My question is is this normal?
Could something be draining my battery?

If so how can I test to see exactly what is causing the battery to lose charge?


Thanks for your help.

 

Not normal. Cars are not designed to need to have the battery charged to start. replace battery, or use a friends to test and see.

either battery is losing charge or something is draining it.

 

Not knowing what kind of load your battery sees does not let us diagnose properly. Let's suppose you have a thumper amp. If your alternator were bad, and you drive around with the amp on all your doing is draining the battery while you drive. For that matter even if you didn't have a thumper you would still be draining the battery when you drive if the alternator were bad.

All you need is volt meter. Charge up your battery and check the voltage across it with at least one of the battery terminals disconnected. Now connect it like normal but leave the car off. Now measure the voltage across the battery. If the voltage is lower by more than .2volts you have something draining the battery. But let's get to the meat and potatoes of your problem.

Next you will need another person to crank the engine while you watch the voltage across the battery with the meter. If your fully charged battery drops below 11 volts while the engine is cranking, the battery is shot. Now once the car starts, observe the voltage across the battery for the last time. With the engine running, the voltage should be higher than before you started cranking the engine. This part is tricky however. If the battery is bad it can make it appear as though the alternator were bad. If that were true the load test of the battery (voltage during cranking) would have shown it.

I suspect your battery is bad (voltage during cranking) also indicating that it won't readily take a charge from your alternator. Be sure to check all the connections in particular, the ones for the ground at the frame and the engine. These connections get missed all the time and can corrode.

 

sounds like a dead battery to me. They dont cost too much, i picked one up for $39 at autozone with 4 year warrenty.

 

"slow poke" did a great job of describing the "shade tree mechanic's" way of testing your battery, nice! A decent garage will have a load/charging system tester that will acocmplish the same thing. Most will do it for free on the assumption that you will buy a battery from them or have the reapirs (if needed) done there. I'd have it tested or do as slo poke described and DIY.

I have had good luck with NAPA batteries, not sure who makes theirs, but they are good. I am a little suspicious of a $39 battery, but it may be great. I mean, an eight pack of D-cells costs like $6-7!

Rich Krause

 

How old is the battery? After about three years, batteries seem to die pretty quick. Batteries also drain quicker in the off state if you have aftermarket alarms, radar detectors and stereos. These can draw a fair amount of current that an older battery can't keep up with.

 

Ok, I'm back to give you more info.

The battery is not old. The previous owner took good care of the car and changed the battery roughly one year before I bought the car. Also, I have NO accessories that would drain the battery more than usual. I barely use any electrical stuff (power windows rarely, power seats sometimes, I never listen to the radio, etc.. you get the picture) Also I was wondering, can readings from the battery gauge be used to diagnose if I have a battery draining problem?

Thanks everyone for the advice. Slopokrodriguez, I can use the charger that the garage gave me to perform the voltage across the battery test? If so I will do it just before putting the car away within the next few days. Thanks alot for your help.

 

The gage on the charger is not the least bit accurate but rather serves as reference to see progress as the battery charges. It too will not load the battery to see if it can deliver what you need.

I see new or not so old batteries every day in my shop. cheap batteries never seem to work right. FYI in Advance and Auto Zone their lawn mower batteries are "seconds" that they buy for $2.00 each. They sell them for about $14 to $17 dollars and take back about 50% of them. They still make out like bandits.

BTW there are only a few manufacturers of batteries in the US. Most batteries like Interstate and several other name brands are made by Johnson Controls.

The batteries that I stock are made by Exide (John Deere are also made by Exide) and they are rotated every month if they are not sold. They will also give us a free replacement for 1 year.

Another unknown fact. I have saved several bad batteries by dumping them out, washing them out several times with water and them refilling with acid and charging them. When I dump them out, a lot of lead particles come out. I summized the particles were shorting out the plates. I can usually bring back about 50% of the batteries I try this with. I'm just trying to save some people money from buying a new battery. Not trying to "put one over on them". Well as it turns out, when defects are returned to the manufacturers that are not too old, the first thing they do is shake them, sort of like a paint shaker. They then charge and test them and off they go for sale somewhere again.

Do the load test and see what happens.

 

If you believe that the battery is good a test you can do is disconnect one of the battery terminals and connect a test light between that terminal and the battery, if the test light glows there is a circuit that is drawing current from the battery. Pull your fuses one at a time until the light goes out, that circuit is the source of your drain. I've had instances where a relay would stick and cause a battery to discharge over a period of several days. Hope this helps.

 

Well I took the car out of storage on friday and brought it home. Guess what I tried to start it this morning and it wouldn't start, just 2 days later (although electrical components seemed to be working ok)

When school finishes on tuesday I will tkae the car to the garage and perform the tests to address this problem and let you know how it goes. Thanks again for your help!