When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
For some reason lately, I've had a hankering about battery charging.
Actually, I know why. The Lincoln LS battery is starting to show it's time for a replacement. This vehicle with its 4 electronic modules eats batteries. It doesn't matter the brand, but every 36 months it's about time. Months, not hours, not a day trip. Plus its winter, when most batteries are purchased.
It's the same battery I use in the F-350, Walmart Everstart Maxx 850, $94. So before I get ready to do the Pro-rated swap, I try to salvage the battery for a little longer. The F-350 batteries have been in storage with only a few months of service, but every 6 months I put them on recharge, the last time July of this year, and it's time for them too.
I've used and talked about the battery tester I've been using for a while since I can't use a refractory specific gravity test on sealed batteries. Chris has it's brother and doesn't think it shows bad batteries that well. It might not. Or maybe it's not that CCA is the best determinant. In a recent discussion Ted brought up these have calcium added to them, so the max charged voltage should be higher than 12.6v, more towards 12.8v. Which brings up the quandary of my tester, what type of battery should it be switched to? They are not AGMs. But if you use SLI (Start-Light-Ignition) it's comparing to 12.6v. I used both SLI and Gel, try to find a gel battery these days.
Anyway, 3 batteries of the same type, different service conditions, and 2 brand new batteries at Walmart I also read this morning. Along with how they recovered with the reconditioning mode.
So just showing what I generated, the charger used and the tester used. It may be that CCA is not the best judgment of a battery condition, but the battery internal resistance is. AGMs have a lower internal resistance then SLI, so they start the vehicle faster and recharge faster. Resistance changes with temperature, colder equals higher resistance, once of the reasons it's harder to start a vehicle in the cold weather.
Not a battery pi$$ing contest. While in the past I've used the tool to find the highest CCA batteries at Walmart, and suggested to do so with other retailers, maybe it's the resistance that's more important.
I took an image of each test and stage in case anyone want's to see something in more detail.
Last edited by TooManyToys.; Jun 20, 2020 at 09:18 AM.
Reason: Removed images that were confusing to Y2K
Jack: I must not be understanding something on the CCA vs internal resistance - just glancing at your table and the two on the shelf batteries versus anything else you tested that came close to them, the CCA and IR tracked pretty close. Tell me what rabbit hole I need to go down...
I’m trying to figure this out too. The LS battery is hurting though.
Usually when I’ve used this tester I set up the parameters and run the test, and it’s shows the voltage and CCA. It also gives an OK, Recharge, or Bad. If you arrow up you can check SOC, SOH and resistance.
CCA may track with resistance, but since resistance goes up with aging, maybe it’s better to follow the resistance of the battery, since it’s resistance that inhibits current flow.
Either way, the charger (is that one you have?) allows for reconditioning, and it seems to do well. It certainly brought battery 1 back to new like resistance, and CCA.
The LS has been struggling lately. Not something Les would notice, but when it drops into the nines the PCM whacks out. In the late fall we had guys come through the neighbor hood cars. Even though the battery saver shut everything down, they left the glovebox and driver’s door ajar. It hastened the battery. I put my voltage monitor in the powerport, and even with long drives of 14.0-14.2v, next morning volts would be at 12.0, just as the first test of that battery shows.
Now that I've got it up and need to put it back in for a few days and see how the LS distresses it. Tough car. It may get warranted, and if it does, maybe battery 2 will go in and the newest battery kept in 2’s place.
The main point of the post was for discussion and to show the ability to recharge an in-service battery. I still like to take an in-service battery that going to sit in a vehicle over the weekend and give it a FULL recharge, something as we know it’s never going to get just being driven around.
If you look at the LS battery, after recon the CCA for an 850 is pretty good, and the state of health and charge both show good percentages, especially compared to where it was. But the resistance is still high compared to its brethren, and that may therefore not transmit all that CCA in a good way, so slow starting, especially with a diesel. So maybe resistance is a better tell.
no battery warmers. They are blanketed but no elec warmers. I have actually had very good luck starting the truck at very cold temps even without the block heater (I sometimes find myself in locations with not access to a plug in) until recently. Its been a great truck but it is now 15 yrs old so I have been purchasing tools for diagnostics and.... spending a lot more time here ;-)
I think it was in my L-N 230a video for one test I hooked up a pair of battery warmers and they were able to flow better with as much voltage drop, less internal resistance. I used for a few tests, they seemed to perform well.
Jack I have the older CTEK 4.3A, but I'm thinking of getting a second one since I have Odysseys in two vehicles. Have to decide if I want/need to go big since I don't disconnect my Trucks batts when trickle charging, and it takes it days to go to float mode...
biter: just a couple ideas - have you thought of getting a couple of Li-Ion Jump starters and attaching those prior to that 1st cold start out in BFE? Second idea would be another full size battery to tie in to passenger side with jumpers, just for the cold start...
Scott
No, it was just meant to show I have the display of the data if someone really needs to see the actual displays, but the data is all in the table.
The point was now I'm starting to look at resistance which may be a better indication of battery health than the CCA readings, influenced after Chris didn't get a warm and fuzzy. Today I'll get the LS battery back in the car and use it for a week to see how it responds in the vehicle. Ease of starting and how well it reabsorbs its charge.
It's just another chapter that fits in with a thread I started two years+ back when I showed I was checking batteries at the store before buying them for their CCA capacity, trying to match or get the highest value. The May 2016 batteries I bought I did not do that and later I found the differential between them. 2016, 2017, 2020..... I guess the progression shows I'm a slow learner.
