On my 07, the OEM battery worked until 2016. Then I needed to jump start it in the morning.

Could have. Should have. I could have, and should have, had a battery vendor test the electrical system, to see if I had a bad battery, bad alternator, bad starter.....but I didn't. I just figured that after 9 years, I needed a new battery.

I replaced it with an Optima Yellow Top. Consumer brainwash. It must be better. Why? It cost more.

The Optima Yellow Top lasted until this year. I was jumpstarting it in the morning. The little gauge I installed on the dashboard was reading around 4 volts. Attach a jumpstart device, and it reads around 15 volts. Truck starts. Driving the truck around, the gauge reads around 14 volts (14 - 14.5). Park the truck. Come back a few hours later. The gauge is around 12 volts, and it starts. I drive it like that all day. Then overnight, the voltage drops again. Every morning, the gauge would indicate that I had anywhere from 4 volts to 7 volts.

I am not a mechanic. I don't know much about cars. I take the battery out, and bring it home. I hook it up to a battery charger with an AGM setting. It's a NOCO 10 amp charger, which is suppose to repair batteries. Hours later, I find the battery is hot, and I can hear crackling and popping noises. Well, that does not seem right. I disconnect the battery charger. A multimeter showed the battery around 11 volts. The next morning, the battery was still warm. The multimeter showed 5 volts. Not wanting to give up, when the battery cooled down, I plugged the charger back in. I wanted to see if this expensive charger could actually repair a battery. The battery gets warm, but not hot. No more cracking and sizzling noise. I leave it overnight. The battery charger was still indicating that it was charging. The battery charger is suppose to completely charge a battery in around 5 hours. The multimeter showed the battery around 11 volts.

I install the battery. The truck starts. I drive it around all day. My gauge shows 14 - 14.5 while driving. After being parked a few hours, the gauge shows around 11 amps. It starts. I drive it around all day. The next morning, the voltage dropped again. I'm no genius. I'm thinking that this battery is no good.

Big disappointment. Motorcraft 9 years. Optima Yellow Top 6 years.

Now here is the part that really makes me feel as stupid as I look. I spoke with several people who all had a similar opinion. The truck was fine as a daily driver. The alternator works. The battery charges. Both batteries began to fail when I stopped driving the truck daily. I was only starting the truck to move it from 1 side of the street to the other. No more than 5 minutes. Less than 1/10th of a mile. I don't drive the truck for a few weeks, it needs a jump start. With any battery that is years past the warranty, it could die when I don't drive the truck. I should drive it at least twice a week. As in drive it all day around town, running errands, etc. Let the alternator charge the battery to maintain it. Then I buy an Optima Red Top.

I don't know what to believe anymore. Optima used to be a good battery, before it was sold to Johnson Controls, production shifted to Mexico, then the battery division was spun off into a company named Clarios. The Yellow Top is suppose to be deep cycle. The Red Top is suppose to be a starting battery. Maybe I should have just bought another Motorcraft.

 

You have a parasitic current draw in your system.

 

You leaving the volt meter hot always maybe? Volt meters draw current you know.

My'07 is on a replacement battery I swapped in about 6 years ago, it's a group 65 Kirkland battery, I think truck came with a group 59 maybe, it is just a normal battery.

 

My '07 battery lasted 13 years. In the V6 base-model XL, they put in the smallest battery. I went to the parts store and got a big HD one that filled that battery tray! It spins that 4.2L like never before!

 

Today, Costco sells InterState batteries with a 3 year warranty. Your battery, from however many years ago, was probably an InterState battery, with a Kirkland label. The Costco InterState battery that they sell today has a 36 month warranty. Which is good, compared to batteries that have a 12 month, 18 month, or 24 month battery. When I was battery shopping, 1 thing caught my attention. Motorcraft batteries are about half the price of the "premium" brand batteries, and Motorcraft batteries have a competitive warranty.




I am using Optima batteries in size 34/78. The size fits into a lot of different vehicles. The side post are very convenient for installing aftermarket electronics. The last one lasted 6 years. Good, or bad, the battery warranty was only for 3 years.





My Transit Connect is still using the OEM Motorcraft. Since I was shopping for a battery for the F-150, I also looked at a battery for the van. I considered a few factors. Power. Will I get better power or performance than the factory Motorcraft. Warranty. Will I get a better warranty than what Ford offers. Price. Will I spend more, or less, than a battery from The Dealership? The final consideration was over the counter sale or internet. I am not paying out of my own pocket, to ship a 50 lb battery back to Summit Racing for the core deposit charge. After looking around, I am pretty sure that I will replace it with a Costco Interstate.

 

The new battery shows 12+ volts in the morning. It's holding a charge.

OEM battery lasted 9 years.

Optima battery lasted 6 years.

That is 1 heckuva parasitic draw to kill the battery, years after the battery warranty expired.

 

I change out batteries every 6 years if they last that long.... OLD batteries dont have the same cranking power / reserve as a new battery... Your on borrowed time if your using a 7-8-9 year old battery.

 

Batteries last longest under optimal conditions. What are the optimal conditions? I don't know. I do know that a car not being driven is not good. The battery loses it's charge. Drive cycles recharge the battery.

I do know that with my motorcycle, because I have a battery maintainer, the battery lasted about 15 years. An OEM battery, which came with a Battery Tender. I wasn't strict about it. If I didn't ride it for a few weeks, I would plug it in until the Battery Tender's green light indicated that the battery was full. Then the next time I was going out for a ride, I plug it in the night before, to make sure that I had a full battery in the morning. It's a Harley Davidson motorcycle. The OEM battery was probably AGM. Harley Davidson used to use Deltran Battery Tender.

The Harley Davidson battery replacement is a ACDelco AGM. It has a 12 month warranty. I've had it now for about 30 months. Harley Davidson now uses NOCO Genius chargers. I bought a NOCO Genius to maintain the new battery.

Why an ACDelco battery on a Harley Davidson? The price was right. If there was a $20 ACDelco battery for my truck, I would buy it too.



Those NOCO Genius chargers appear to be pretty good. Their jumpstarters are pretty good. I like that they have settings for regular batteries, AGM, and lithium. Although I'm not so sure that the "repair" feature does much. I haven't seen any old, depleted battery brought back to life. I agree with steve(ill). If a battery is 7, 8, 9 years old, and it finally drops in voltage, can't hold a charge, or won't even take a charge - it's done. There's no crossing fingers, and hoping that a $100+ battery charger will "recondition", or reverse the stratification and sulfation.

I bought 2 of the NOCO chargers. A 1 amp for the motorcycle, and a 10 amp for cars. I know that the $30 1 amp charger is doing a pretty good job of maintaining my $20 battery. As for the 10 amp, I shrug my shoulders. I don't know. The 6 year old Optima Yellow Top from my F-150 did not do that great. The battery got hot, I heard popping, cracking, and sizzling noise from the battery. It got enough electricity back into the battery for me to start the truck and drive it around for a day. But the next morning, the battery voltage was back down to 7 volts. Maybe the battery was just beyond it's service life. When I got my Optima Red Top in the mail, I wanted it to have a full charge before I installed it. The 10 amp charger was great. It cycled like it was suppose to. The lights indicated the charge level at full after a few hours. The battery never got hot. The charger then slowly flashed the green light to indicate that it was maintaining the battery level. I guess the battery chargers work really well with a new battery that isn't damaged and depleted.

 

I'm surprised OP got 6 years out of an Optima. That's pretty good I'd say. Optimas are junk, have been ever since they parted with Gates....and now it seems Gates is junk these days, too.

Unless you're running a truly specialty app like racing, prolonged winching, marine, Arctic cold or Sahara heat etc a standard battery is the ticket.

 

People say that. People say that they used to be better.

I have no real science to reinforce any of my opinions.

I used to buy cheap batteries from the auto parts stores. Not their "premium" lines. Just stuff that was on sale. The kind of batteries with an 18 or 24 month warranty. Those batteries often didn't make it to the warranty. Then I would go back, and the store would "prorate" according to whatever metrix. They would give me a discount off the replacement, and then that battery would last 11 out of 18 months. The cycle repeats.

It took me years to learn that the inexpensive batteries were not worth buying. I found that buying the $300 battery, like Optima, was better than buying $150 battery every year to year and a half.

I also discovered that there were different warranty terms. Better battery has a replacement warranty. Not so good battery has prorated warranty, which applies to a percentage of price on similar replacement.

 

When I bought my Kirkland it was then the best rated by Consumer Reports. I do not know who actually made it, only that it has not disappointed me.

 

In March of 2018 I bought a Value battery from Wal-Mart for about 50.00 with like only a 6 month warranty for our 78 F150 that we have been working on. We decided even if it only lasted a year or so it was worth not having to swap in one of my FIL's boat batteries just to move it around to work on it.

At that time the truck was 150 miles away at my FIL's. The truck was only started a few times until that November when we trailered it to Texas to work on it in earnest. It is still going strong (knock, knock).

Before we brought it home, each time we went to work on it we would put it on the charger before the first start. The truck has been a daily driver for my son for the last 2+ years. He has less than a mile to HS and only about 4 to and from work.

I occasionally put it on the charger when I think about it. I use a Schumacher "Ship to Shore" charger that does the "refresh" when needed. We also did the 3G upgrade on the truck and keep the water topped off the cables and posts clean as well as grounds and have newish (3yr old) cables.

To be honest I have been very pleased with the Wal-Mart batteries I have put in my wife's Nissan and of course this one. I think a lot of the longevity of any battery is treating it as a routine maintenance item.

 

The Red Top Optima lasted 20 months. A big disappointment.




The replacement is an ACDelco. I can't wait to see how long this will last.




Car batteries have really gone up in price from a year ago.

 

The first thing that I do with all new batteries is top them off before I install them. This battery was completely charged out of the box. Price wise, between a GM battery and a Ford battery, it's only a $7 difference. The ACDelco is an AGM. The Ford is a traditional lead acid. The GM has 775 CCA. The Ford group 65 comes with options of 650 CCA, 750 CCA, and 850 CCA.

 

As the saga continues, I am using a Noco 10 amp charger on the 20 month old Optima Red Top battery. It looks like it's taking a charge. The real question is if it will hold the charge. A battery is useless if the voltage drops immediately after you turn the car off.

I'm going to give this one chance, and only one chance. I can't play with a dead battery forever. The charger has a "repair mode". We'll see what it does.

I wish I had more sophisticated equipment to load test it and test it for cranking amps. But I'm not spending more money to buy tools. Batteries die. Then we buy new batteries.









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