2013 Evoque won't start

[Station1966]

My wife has an automatic 2013 Evoque.


She went to start it yesterday the headlights flickered, the Speedo needle flickered up and down, and a 'gearbox fault' and 'steering column locked' warning was display ed, and the car wouldn't start. This morning I went out to look at it and noticed the rear red lights were illuminated. Inside none of the dash lights came on and instead there was a ticking/clicking noise from the glovebox and the hazard warning lights button flickered (but the hazard lights weren't on externally). I suspect a battery issue. Using a simple multi meter set at 20 DCV I got a reading of 0.00. I have also read about a small auxillary battery positioned near to the fuses beneath the glove box which can cause similar symptoms apparently?

Any help would be appreciated.

[Krikkit]

Remove and charge the battery and try again. Or just buy another.

I'm assuming it's hardly been used?

[Muddle238]

New battery required.

Modern cars are stuffed full of electrical systems and computers that require an electrical heartbeat, even when the vehicle is parked up. It only takes a couple of weeks’ lack of use for the battery to drain sufficiently that the car refuses to start, despite having enough juice to turn on random lights and bring up various error messages on the dash. Combine furlough/lockdown/WFH with the cold snap we’ve had, there will be loads of modern cars suffering the same fate at the moment.

[Station1966]

Thank you both. Can I just remove the old one myself and replace with a new one or will that cause the electrics to have a fit?

[Krikkit]

Does it have a stop/start system? If so it'll have an AGM battery which may need coding to the car at some point to reset the charge cycles, but it won't stop the car starting and working fine.