zprincess

iTrader: (2)

Today we went to start the car to attend a car show and the battery was dead. We had to jump it to get it going.

In Florida the heat is hard on batteries. We attended a car show about a month ago and ran all three light kits, inside, outside and glass for around 5 hours. We let the car sit in the garage for a month and voila dead battery.

What brand and type of battery should we get to eliminate this problem? I was told tonight that interstate batteries have a special battery that costs about $40 more than their normal battery but is specially designed to run excess car electronics like we have. Any thoughts on the subject?

Nic@CiNcity

iTrader: (93)

Not sure about a battery, but maybe think about adapting a plug in so that you can just use a wall plug in to power everything.

BootieMAN

iTrader: (2)

This is what you need if you're going to let your car sit for long periods:

onecoolee

I have had nothing but nightmares with my Optima Yellow top. I know alot of people here have them, and love them, but I am switching it out soon for a Red Top or maybe just a good ole Interstate Megatron Plus... I am tired of dealing with getting into a dead car. I drive my Z once a week, sometimes twice, and its dead about every other time I try to drive it... I have always put a C-tek maintainer/charger on the yellow top in the winter months, and even had my battery analyzed by a couple local shops and they insist that its good, but it holds no charge at all, and it barely starts the car let alone deep cycles...

themadhatterxxx

iTrader: (9)

I've only heard bad things about them and my own experience is 2 Yellowtops in 2 years dead...unreliable expensive junk. My car will die if it doesn't start every 2 days with this POS battery. Only thing that saves it is I have my remote starter set to start up the car once it detects that the battery level reaches 12V...runs for 15 minutes, then shuts off. I've heard good things about that Interstate Megatron battery tho and I'll probably swap out for it soon.

winchman

You should disconnect the battery and put an amp meter between the lug and the battery terminal to see how much current is being drawn with everything turned off. I suspect you have something drawing excessive current and running the battery down.

onecoolee

This is the first report similar to my own experience and at least I am not alone with my opinions. It does suck that you are having the same problems as me, and I can sympathize... I got my yellow top from a local 4x4 shop and when I bought it, they sold it to me as new, but I really think it was sitting around their shop for awhile. I started having problems after a few months and it became ridiculous after the first winter, even with a good batter tender installed all winter. I did find a stereo cap sucking alot of juice when the car was off, which has now been removed but my problems still exist. I have heard that when these batteries sit in stock for months, they develop problems holding charge... but after having it tested everywhere locally, everyone tells mne that its fine... but Optima told me that Autozone and Advance and most local battery check places don't have the proper equipmetn to test it... so I took it to the 4x4 shop and they tested it and said it was fine. Of course, because they don't want to replace it or be involved with the paperwork or drama of getting me a new one.

I did check my idle current draw and its anywhere from 20mA to 50mA and it fluctuates. I installed a 200A Stinger relay to isolate the stereo and electronics from the back, so that stuff is no longer pulling any current when the car ignition is off, and my next step is to add a delay timer to the battery to prevent the installed relay from turning on until the car is actually started, like 4 or 5 seconds. I know the equipment I have causes some immediate drain, but I have had similar systems in previous vehicles and never had battery problems like this... I even used the stock battery for a year or so with this same stereo equipmenmt, and it was better that the yellow top... I had lights dimming when the bass hit, but no startup problems.

With all of the hassles I have had its real difficult for me to go out and spend another 200 bucks on a yellow top that may do the same thing again.... Optima has not been very easy or good to work with and I feel like their distributor sold me old stock to begin with, and no one has been willing to prorate the battery or do anything as far as fixing the issue and getting me soemthign that works... I am not the kind of guy who after being put through the wringer, will give something another chance so quickly, so I will probably go for the megatron plus myself. I believe the MTP-35 is an 84 month battery and a direct drop in replacement. It would be nice to put a MTP-24 in, but I think the length will require some mods to the battery tray.

I guess in the spring, my Z will have a new Megatron battery...

themadhatterxxx

iTrader: (9)

That sounds about right...I had the car dropped off at local audio shop around my area, I told him to keep my car for a week and to check EVERYTHING...so he re-works the wiring on certain things and the car still had a fluctuating draw like yours, between 30-50mA which he said was closer to normal given the fact that I had some aftermarket accessories.

So maybe I had a parasitic draw of 150-200mA which killed the battery to the point of not being able to start a few times before I chose to do anything about it but my main gripe is I think once the battery drains to a point where it gets deeply discharged, it gets beyond the point of revival despite what Optima's website claims. I even used a CTek 7002 charger on the thing to revive it after being deeply discharged (They have a setting specific for Optima AGM/Gel batteries) and it would die again just 2 days after a full charge WTF? Maybe I got unlucky with 2 duds but really not worth the cost or the hassle of going out to a dead car when other comparable batteries with similar CCA's are $50-$100 less.

onecoolee

mad...

Our problems and solutions can't be much more identical. I had about 120-150mA of parasitic draw with the equipment in the back hooked up too. Thats why I added that isolation relay.

I too, bought a Ctek charger (7002 I think) based on Optimas recommendations for winter charging and tending and have run through several recovery/restore cycles and standard recharge cycles... and no matter what I do, this yellow top I have is junk. Its not recoverable... everyone tells me its good, but when i let it sit, its dead in 2 days. I even let it sit for a little over a day, after a full charge from the local Autozone, after they told me it was good, and it read 11.2V... that's not a typical voltage of a "good" battery.

I drove the car yesterday, about 20 miles to work, and by the end of my workday, the car hesitated to start when I left...

I did an internet search on "optima yellow top won't hold charge" and found hundreds of threads by Corvette, Porsche, and other sports car enthusiasts and owners, and all of them had dead yellow or red tops that were not recoverable. Someone even went as far to say that Optimas QC has gone out of the window since being bought up by Johnson controls a few years back... apparently the early models for both yellow and red tops were solid and very reliable, but as of late, they just plain suck. Even Amazon sells them and they have about 50% good reviews and 50% really bad... its obvious that there's a problem here, and by Optima only offering a 1 year warranty, they can sell an inferior product that lasts a year and is then deemed worthless... apparently they are counting on the reputation that they built early on, to last them forever, and in htis economy, it won't happen. Paying almost twice as much for something that lasts less than half as long isn't going to cut it in today's marketplace, and Optima will eventually sink if they don't fix these issues. I read about 20 recent posts where people were cursing their products and only 3 or 4 guys were defending optimas... its sad. I have called and they won't do anything for me, except tell me to goto to an optima service center or distributor and have the battery checked.... which I have, and everytime they find the same thing...GOOD. What a complete joke.

I am done farting around with it, and I will go old school and get an Interstate lead acid that works and is reliable...

winchman

What kind of test do they perform to determine the battery is "good", and what sort of equipment do they use to perform the test?

onecoolee

I had it tested at the local Advance Auto, Autozone, and Firestone service center. The Fiorestone service center said that it checked out good, but that he didn't really think Optimas were worth the money. They sold a couple different types there, and they sold Interstate, which is what he recommended.

The Autozone and Advance guys had simialr testers, like a mobile cart with a set of jumper cables to hook to the battery. It was not tested or checked in the car... it was disconnected and dropped off at each place. The test sequence took a couple minutes, and I believe it put the battery under some sort of load condition to verify that it was holding some charge. After it was done, it printed out a receipt that said "Good" or "bad". I had the ADvance place charge it for me using their charger, and when I left there it was fully charged, and thats when I let it sit overnight to see what it read the next day... and it was already low.

Batteries are not rocket science, and getting in my car once a week and actually having it startup isn't rocket science either... it was an unfortunate mistake that I got a bad yellow top and it was bad from the start, defintely not as bad as it is now... but the company or their distributor never offered to do anything about it. I have always had great luck with Interstate, so I will travel down that road next... and see where it goes.

themadhatterxxx

iTrader: (9)

First brisk night saturday night, even after being on my trickle charger the whole night, the battery sounds very weak and barely has enough juice to start the car sunday morning. Drove over to firestone and picked up the interstate megatron plus mtp-35. $114 n change after tax. After a 20 min. drive, tempted my luck and yellowtop battery almost doesn't start in the parking lot. Got home quick 20 min. install.

We'll see how long this lasts...you will need to pick up a pair of shims that go on top the negative and positive terminals because they are a tad thinner than the Yellowtop's and on my car the connectors were sliding right off even after tightening down. $1.99 at autozone.

graffkid732

iTrader: (44)

Just read this and didn't see it, maybe I missed it, if so I'm sorry.

While charging a battery, will 1 hour a week be enough to keep it going to not drain it? Also, should I disconnect the batter from the car, or can I charge it hooked up. Thanks, again sorry if I missed it.

winchman

Get a charger with an amp meter. When the meter reads near zero, the battery will be charged sufficiently. How long that takes will depend on the the condition of the battery, how much current is being drawn while the car is off, and some other factors.

A good trickle charger might be better, if you have power available where the car is being kept.

You don't need to disconnect the battery while you're charging it.

DavesZ#3

iTrader: (26)

+1 on trickle charger.

KornerCarver

iTrader: (2)

I have a BatterTender for my Z. If I know the car isn't going to be driven for a few days, I hook it up to the BatteryTender. I still have my original battery and it will be 8 years old on July 1. That thing has lasted for an amazing length of time.

SSNOS

iTrader: (9)

If you are going tp run your electronics at a show for several hours. I would personally get a 2 battery switch and a deep cycle battery for use at the shows. Then you can switch from your starting battery to the deep cycle at the shows and run the electronics and even if that battery drains completely, you can switch back to the starting battery and drive away. Starting batteries are just not made to continuously discharge

DaveJackson

iTrader: (5)

SSNOS has it bang-on.
A regular lead acid battery is not designed to be discharged continuously whereas a "deep cycle" is.
I think, (not sure), that the popularity of yellow tops came from the audio community but they can't do it all. I think it's a bit like all season tires... They're good but when it comes to a fair bit of snow and ice, proper snow tires slay them.
(Since you're from Florida, that analogy probably isn't the best.)

SSNOS

iTrader: (9)

The yellow top from what I understand is pretty much a regular starting battery that has a bit thicker plates and a stronger case to handle vibrations better. I would not consider it a true deep cycle.

graffkid732

iTrader: (44)

Thanks for reply guys.