996TT battery

[gixxer1000]

Had the car for around 4 months now and didn't drive it for 6 days recently and got no response when I pressed the button on the key. I "manually" opened the drivers door with the key and then started it and all was well again, but definitely had a moment of dispair when I thought I wasn't going to get the door open.

Having recently come out of 10+ years of TVR ownership, the one thing that drove me nuts was the poor battery life when not driven. Is my 996TT possibly worse? (I'd get around 3 weeks out of the Cerbera before the battery went flat.)

Is this normal? Could I have a duff battery/earth/other electrical gremlin?

I should probably buy a trickle charger thing, but wouldn't know where to start (never mind how to use it).

Any tips?

Cheers,
gixxer

[hoges11]

the 996 has a bettery saving feature which does this. As a result If you leave it for long (several days) the doors will not open on the fob but once you have opened manually all is back to normal. So what you experienced was a design feature. Having said that leavinga 996 for 3 weeks may be enough to run it down anyway.

[9hellheaven]

Just buy a trickle charger..I leave my 997 on for the whole winter (its my second/summer car)..she fires first time all the time.
Its important to keep a battery charged, once they slip into a coma they are never the same..flat batteries/bump starts/then a long run to re-charge is not the answer.

[slippydiff]

This may shed some light on said issue:-

www.pistonheads.co.uk/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&t=352374&r=4795182&hm=51675#4795182

If you were p*ssed off about your Tivvie battery going flat you're not going to be a happy bunny........

Edited by slippydiff on Friday 9th February 22:59

[mogv8]

Bosch silver top appears to be the recommendation. Standard Porsche item not as good.

Replaced mine a few weeks back and no issues since.

[rumplestiltskin]

Yadda Yadda. Had Porsche battery in my 996TT for 4 years before needed replacing, the new one that in there is fine, sometimes 2 weeks between starting the car & no probs at all.
As for that link saying you get problems with the warning lights when you replace the battery.....never in my experience (i have had 3 996's) or others who have 996's either. probably a case of "it happened to me so it must have happened to everyone else" without really checking if it had first.
996 batteries are fast becoming the new RMS, thanks to forums like this.

R.

[supermono]

The battery on my lawn mower goes flat over time and that doesn't have a fancy alarm. Everybody knows that lead acid batteries leak charge away over time anyhow never mind keeping clocks and alarms going. Battery conditioners are cheap as chips, just leave it plugged in and the battery will last forever*

SM
*maybe.

[DiscoColin]

Gentlemen, I think that the hostility towards the OE Porsche battery stems not so much from that it isn't exceptionally good, but that they charge £232 for it and it is not exceptionally good.