BMW dealership want how much for a new battery !!!!!
Discussion
Folks,
BMW 730 d. 2008
Disaster, took the Mrs away for the weekend,she was actually pretty cool after we had to walk 2 miles to train station and endure 6 hours and 3 train changes getting back home ! ,The nice man from the AA told us he was unable to jump start battery as it needed resetting at BMW etc etc..
Things could be worse I thought,until the not so nice man from BMW just called me to say the diagnostic test showed the side lights were lt on for 18 hours and the battery has been drained, well please charge it I said, unable to do that he replied,it's dead, needs a new battery, £382 fitted.
My question to you knowledgable people doesn't concern the price tag more the unable to charge it situation, surely battery's can be charged up no ?
BMW 730 d. 2008
Disaster, took the Mrs away for the weekend,she was actually pretty cool after we had to walk 2 miles to train station and endure 6 hours and 3 train changes getting back home ! ,The nice man from the AA told us he was unable to jump start battery as it needed resetting at BMW etc etc..
Things could be worse I thought,until the not so nice man from BMW just called me to say the diagnostic test showed the side lights were lt on for 18 hours and the battery has been drained, well please charge it I said, unable to do that he replied,it's dead, needs a new battery, £382 fitted.
My question to you knowledgable people doesn't concern the price tag more the unable to charge it situation, surely battery's can be charged up no ?
I had a similar shock when I had to replace the battery on my 2005 B7. I ended up up buying the battery and fitting it myself for around £250. They do warn you that they have to plug the car in to tell it that its got a new battery but it didn't make a difference and I got them to do this at the next service.
Fully discharging a car battery will affect it's ability to hold charge somewhat, but after one full discharge it should still be ok, and certainly should be able to accept a good trickle charge. I would attempt this myself, and then if really needed get a new battery. Certainly don't let them charge you over £300 for a new battery and fitting!
I had a similar experience 
Read about it here and what I done: http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...
Read about it here and what I done: http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...
That's what I hate about these big large luxo barges. A flat battery means a NEW battery.
A customer of mine left his S-class side lights on over night and found the next morning that the car could not start. We tried starting it with some jump leads and a massive truck battery to no avail. In the end we had to give it a new battery. He wasn't happy and looked at me as though I had fleeced him and I wasn't happy that I may have upset someone.
A customer of mine left his S-class side lights on over night and found the next morning that the car could not start. We tried starting it with some jump leads and a massive truck battery to no avail. In the end we had to give it a new battery. He wasn't happy and looked at me as though I had fleeced him and I wasn't happy that I may have upset someone.
tdog7 said:
Fully discharging a car battery will affect it's ability to hold charge somewhat, but after one full discharge it should still be ok, and certainly should be able to accept a good trickle charge. I would attempt this myself, and then if really needed get a new battery. Certainly don't let them charge you over £300 for a new battery and fitting!
Well, it depends - sidelights are brilliant at hammering a battery down to dead zero. I did this once and it was so flat the analogue clock had stopped, I got less than half a volt on my meter. And then it'll be sulphated and generally, you're f
ked..Yes, you can sometimes get them to recover with a decent charger, but they're never quite the same again after that, in my experience. I wouldn't want one in a car so heavily dependent on it like the OP's, anyway. I used to deal with battery warranty claims a fair bit, and honestly, I could tell from my test results whether the customer had knackered it at least once in its life with alarming accuracy!
I'm interested as to how the battery can be so much money though, I bet it isn't that hard to get to and last I checked you couldn't really pay more than £150 for a non-race automotive battery.
Jesus. And I felt hard done by last week when I replaced the battery in my Corrado for £65.99 for a decent 63Ah Bosch Silver!
Would love to know their justification for the price.. according to a random battery website I went on, for your car should be a 100Ah and you should be able to get the battery for between £100-£150 for a decent brand - so the rest will be labour on top and stuff by the dealer. Ouch.
Would love to know their justification for the price.. according to a random battery website I went on, for your car should be a 100Ah and you should be able to get the battery for between £100-£150 for a decent brand - so the rest will be labour on top and stuff by the dealer. Ouch.
Edited by Chicane-UK on Tuesday 19th March 10:33
OK - I just spoke to my friend. So apparently there is no real magic in terms of swapping the battery, provided you can find the right size for your model of car - you should even be able to find that in Halfords (in their little book of batteries or whatever).
Apparently the 7 series ECU records data about the battery so that, over time as the efficiency of the battery decreases, the car knows to reduce the amount of energy that it attempts to store in the battery. This is the counter that needs resetting when a new batter is installed, however my friend assures me that you don't NEED to do this immediately as an urgent thing, and that if you stick a new battery on, the car should be absolutely fine - but that you should then find a BMW specialist / independent who can reset this counter for you. And all should be well.
Hope that helps.
Apparently the 7 series ECU records data about the battery so that, over time as the efficiency of the battery decreases, the car knows to reduce the amount of energy that it attempts to store in the battery. This is the counter that needs resetting when a new batter is installed, however my friend assures me that you don't NEED to do this immediately as an urgent thing, and that if you stick a new battery on, the car should be absolutely fine - but that you should then find a BMW specialist / independent who can reset this counter for you. And all should be well.
Hope that helps.
Cheers everyone, and chicanes friend,
Halfords do 2 battery's for this type of car priced at 110 and 130 but not suitable for mine because of stop start, I found a place in Liverpool that quoted 165 for a suitable battery delivered overnight. But I'm on the school run at 3-30 today !
So I'm looking at 170 odd from europarts a 5 minute walk to BMW and I'm guessing 100 to fit, if BMW don't charge me for telling me it's flat that is saving 100 quid on walking 5 mins, which is nice.
However the BMW service desk have had an engaged phone for the last 20 mins, I'll try again, any guesses as to what they want to charge to just fit it ?
Halfords do 2 battery's for this type of car priced at 110 and 130 but not suitable for mine because of stop start, I found a place in Liverpool that quoted 165 for a suitable battery delivered overnight. But I'm on the school run at 3-30 today !
So I'm looking at 170 odd from europarts a 5 minute walk to BMW and I'm guessing 100 to fit, if BMW don't charge me for telling me it's flat that is saving 100 quid on walking 5 mins, which is nice.
However the BMW service desk have had an engaged phone for the last 20 mins, I'll try again, any guesses as to what they want to charge to just fit it ?
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