Batteries....is it me or are they different now?

[dkn1997]

I have had this thing happen to me twice in the last 3-4 years. Once on my old daily driver 99 grand prix, and just last week in the charger.

The battery gives up the ghoste in an instant... with no warning.  On the Grand Prix a few years ago, wife drove it to church and came out to leave and it was stone dead. I showed up and it wouldn't even take a jump...and the pos terminal came right out of the battery.  No warning at all, no slow cranking, etc... battery was original to car so it was about 5-6 yrs old at the time. 

Last week, I moved the charger to the street to clean the garage out.  It started perfect and all seemed well.  6 hours later I go to put in the garage and I get clicky clicky.  I cleaned the terminals, even replacing the entire pos terminal all the way from batt to starter.  Even with my charger on the max setting ("225 amp hot start") all it would do was engage the starter against the teeth on the flex plate with a loud click.  I swapped out the batt for a new one and found that the lower corner had split and leaked out.  small split and not much of the dreaded white powder on my bat tray.  I get it that this is the cause of the failure, but I don't ever remember batteries failing all of the sudden like this.  I remember them slow cranking  for a while so you had some warning. 

Are they making them that different?  I'd like an explanation of this just for my own head.  Not that  it matters a hell of a lot.  change the battery and off you go.. but call me curious

[Brock Lee]

The house brand parts store batteries suck these days. I have switched to Interstate in all my cars.

[Ghoste]

Interstate have to be the worst.

[warpspeed]

I bought a battery from Auto Zone for my Ram 2500 Diesel a couple of years ago.  It died recently, so I went back to Auto zone.  I turns out it failed within the warrenty, three years, and they completely replaced it foc.  Yeah!

[BigBlockSam]

i've had good luck with Interstate 

[69rtse4spd]

i've had good luck with Interstate 

I also have had good luck with them, (Interstate), they make them for Mopar, get them at my dealer.

[flyinlow]

I have gone to the Optima on three of my cars. Suppose to be good for long periods of inactivity. Makes trunk mount easy. No vents. Oldest one is 3 years old,so I will see.

[Ghoste]

I swear to God, at the auctions 7 out of 10 dead batteries that come in will be Interstate.  Second worst seem to be Optima but after asking around I'm told that the gel batteries don't like extended periods of sitting around.  Go figure.

[Cooter]

Without understanding how batteries work, you can't understand fully how they "Go in an instant" with no warning....

You would be surprized at how many people expect WAY too much from vehicles today...I personally, blame this on depending on technology and trying to cram WAY TOO MUCH into their day...People back in the day, figured if you got 50K miles out of a car, it was a "Good car"...If you got 2 years out of a battery, it was a "good battery"..Nowadays, it would seem that people expect their car to live through NO service maint. what so ever..You would be amazed at how many vehicles come in with the original coolant in the radiator with well over 200K miles on the car and they of course are wondering why the heater core blew, along with the Head gaskets...Not reallizing that coolant if left in a cooling system subjected to electrical current being run through it daily (Remember, the engine block is where the cars GROUND hooks up) breaks down to an acid base and begins to eat everything in sight...I've seen cars with batteries that have so much corrosion around the Pos. cable end that the car won't even start and the terminal has gotten so hot that it has melted clean out of the batterycase. Remember, that a bad connection (IE: CORROSION) causes HEAT buildup...They go to Advance Auto Parts, or Auto Zoo and get that pimple faced kid behind the counter to "Install that brand new battery" for them, NOT reallizing that this kid doesn't know the first thing about cleaning your 10 year old terminals BEFORE he hooks up that brand new battery...I've seen cars with 15K miles on the oil changes...The "Excuse"? "Well, I just haven't had time"...I call BS, there's PLENTY of time for you to spend $5K on a new engine now isn't it?...I've seen transmissions with fluid that I can't tell it from the engine oil...Of course, NOBODY flushes the transmission until it is slipping so badly it won't move....Too late...Same thing with batteries...Today, the average life of a battery is around 5 years if the rest of the charging/starting system is in good shape...Now, this is an average, as batteries are getting cheaper and cheaper made these days..Just thank yourselves the next time you scream bloody murder when the Mechanic says that brand new Interstate Battery with a 4 year warranty, will cost you $120.00...You will go for the cheaper, $70.00 "AutoCraft", ""Wally World", "Dura-last", whatever, everytime..Then, wonder why it didn't last but 3 years and is now dead.....
Now, with all this said, There is a such thing as COLD cranking amps, and cranking amps...The CRANKING amps is the amount of amperage the battery will Supply at a given temp, say 70 Degrees. The COLD cranking amps are what it will do when it's 20 Degrees. A Battery has to work three times as hard, the colder it gets. So, A bettery that starts just fine all summer long, may not be worth a damn come the first colder day...

How many here have used the alternator as a Battery charger? I mean, once the dead battery is jumped, how many here have heard that alternator "Whirr" and simply thought, "Hell, it'll charge it back up"? An Alternator is a battery maintainer, NOT a battery charger, even though it is used as such...A Battery has 6 lead plates. As the Lead falls off the plates from riding over rough roads and such, the lead builds up on the bottom of the plates and causes a "Dead cell"...Once there's a dead cell in the battery, it can check "Ok" by that same kid at the Auto Parts store and be bad. A battery with a dead cell is only as strong as the DEAD CELL....Hope this helps...Don't even get me started on the Jeep guys that see "Trail Rated" on the side and think they can put 'em in the mud up to the hood and suck water down the engine.....

[chargergirl]

Cooter...I know one of these people you so described. He has a small Dodge and Ford 3500. He comes to my man and tells him. "Mark, Sparks fly off the passenger side of my truck at night only". (It was really hard for Mark to keep a straight face). So he fixed the "night spark" problem...but the guy didn't want to buy a rotor. It looked like the moon surface. Then he comes with his truck...the Dodge...wanted to sell it for a song cause "It has NEVER run right". So Mark fixes it...runs like top...it's a '96-V-6, w/3 spark plug electrodes burned off. Never been to the dealer since the 12K mile check. Had 150K miles on it. Should have bought that truck.

[flyinlow]

I have had good service with OEM ,Diehard and Napa Battery's. Every fall I take them out of the car/truck /motorcycle, wash and inspect them. Check the tray and hold down  for corrosion then reinstall  ,cleaning the connections. If the battery is approaching its rated life I start shopping for a GOOD replacement. That last year out of the battery is not worth the aggravation.

The Optima is a glass mat spiral wound cell . Use the same size in the Charger, El Camino and 04 Ram. I hope it's a good battery and not just a fad.

[resq302]

Ive had fantastic luck with Interstate batteries.  Ive had Die hards that crapped out within a year even after checking the alternator, terminals, and even ground locations.  Once I changed over to Interstate battery brands, I get a min of 5 years if no more out of them.  I got 4 years out of my factory installed battery for my F150.

[BigBlockSam]

i have the Interstate batt in my daytona for 7 years but i keep my cars plugged in all year round

[Ghoste]

I can only report what I've experienced.

[dkn1997]

Without understanding how batteries work, you can't understand fully how they "Go in an instant" with no warning....

You would be surprized at how many people expect WAY too much from vehicles today...I personally, blame this on depending on technology and trying to cram WAY TOO MUCH into their day...People back in the day, figured if you got 50K miles out of a car, it was a "Good car"...If you got 2 years out of a battery, it was a "good battery"..Nowadays, it would seem that people expect their car to live through NO service maint. what so ever..You would be amazed at how many vehicles come in with the original coolant in the radiator with well over 200K miles on the car and they of course are wondering why the heater core blew, along with the Head gaskets...Not reallizing that coolant if left in a cooling system subjected to electrical current being run through it daily (Remember, the engine block is where the cars GROUND hooks up) breaks down to an acid base and begins to eat everything in sight...I've seen cars with batteries that have so much corrosion around the Pos. cable end that the car won't even start and the terminal has gotten so hot that it has melted clean out of the batterycase. Remember, that a bad connection (IE: CORROSION) causes HEAT buildup...They go to Advance Auto Parts, or Auto Zoo and get that pimple faced kid behind the counter to "Install that brand new battery" for them, NOT reallizing that this kid doesn't know the first thing about cleaning your 10 year old terminals BEFORE he hooks up that brand new battery...I've seen cars with 15K miles on the oil changes...The "Excuse"? "Well, I just haven't had time"...I call BS, there's PLENTY of time for you to spend $5K on a new engine now isn't it?...I've seen transmissions with fluid that I can't tell it from the engine oil...Of course, NOBODY flushes the transmission until it is slipping so badly it won't move....Too late...Same thing with batteries...Today, the average life of a battery is around 5 years if the rest of the charging/starting system is in good shape...Now, this is an average, as batteries are getting cheaper and cheaper made these days..Just thank yourselves the next time you scream bloody murder when the Mechanic says that brand new Interstate Battery with a 4 year warranty, will cost you $120.00...You will go for the cheaper, $70.00 "AutoCraft", ""Wally World", "Dura-last", whatever, everytime..Then, wonder why it didn't last but 3 years and is now dead.....
Now, with all this said, There is a such thing as COLD cranking amps, and cranking amps...The CRANKING amps is the amount of amperage the battery will Supply at a given temp, say 70 Degrees. The COLD cranking amps are what it will do when it's 20 Degrees. A Battery has to work three times as hard, the colder it gets. So, A bettery that starts just fine all summer long, may not be worth a damn come the first colder day...

How many here have used the alternator as a Battery charger? I mean, once the dead battery is jumped, how many here have heard that alternator "Whirr" and simply thought, "Hell, it'll charge it back up"? An Alternator is a battery maintainer, NOT a battery charger, even though it is used as such...A Battery has 6 lead plates. As the Lead falls off the plates from riding over rough roads and such, the lead builds up on the bottom of the plates and causes a "Dead cell"...Once there's a dead cell in the battery, it can check "Ok" by that same kid at the Auto Parts store and be bad. A battery with a dead cell is only as strong as the DEAD CELL....Hope this helps...Don't even get me started on the Jeep guys that see "Trail Rated" on the side and think they can put 'em in the mud up to the hood and suck water down the engine.....

besides these two failures, I have had tremendous luck with batteries over the years.  I just got rid of ford van with a battery that was in there when I bought it on 2003.  It was a motorcraft battery so it could have been OE for all I know.   The factory battery in my 98 Taurus lasted about 8 years.  the Factory battery in my 02 Tahoe actually did give me some signs that it was getting hinky in 2009 so I swapped it out.  This latest failure and the one in my Grand Prix (that was an as delivered new Battery)  stick out in my mind as "special" because they died so quick. One in about an hour and the other in about 6.  Before that they seemed perfect.  so why do they go so fast again? lol