Battery capacity

[FFMan]

The battery on the new (to me) Griff is a bit suspect - what do you think ?

I keep it topped up on the optimate, but if i forget for a week, there isn't enough juice to start the car. The optimate goes green but I've seen this before, it can't actually measure the capacity just the voltage.

A week doesn't seem long for just the clock and alarm to drain it does it ?

[mongoose]

It does sound weak,i'd buy a new maintainance free one,and fit a forget(for a year or two anyway).Might be worth checking the current drain with an ammeter first though,just in case.

[Guillotine]

its well iffy then. as mongoose says, if there's no excessive drain from a fault on the car it should last about 2 weeks or so. you should be able to leave your car at the airport for a two week holiday with no issues...ya griffs the same.

andy
tvrmonster

[jonathant]

I think the longest I've left my 99 Chimaera is about 18 days with no charger. It started fine. It's worth checking the drain the car puts on the battery to make sure it's not excessive. Don't forget the alarm system too!

[bigdods]

make sure you remove the face plate from the stereo - I have heard about quite a few models that continue to draw significant standby power as long as the face plate is in place even when they are turned off. Just doing this seems to have solved my battery problems :-)

[FFMan]

good tips - i'll get the ammeter on it before i condemn it

[FFMan]

ok - the idle current is 210ma i.e .21 amp or approx one fifth of an amp. so 1 amp/hour in 5 hours, so 70x5=350 hours or 14.5 days (assumes a type 72 battery is approx 70 amp/hour which a quick google seems to suggest)

so my battery is well tired then.

removing the radio front made no difference but it was worth a try.