Battery problem

[Clunkclick]

Since I'm a project guy results take priority over process, I'm always looking for shortcuts because there are deadlines and budgets to meet, paperwork is the enemy of practical progress.

You two sound institutionalised to my delicate ears, I've learned to selectively ignore the hum, click and buzz of career administrators in order to get things done.

Well, GFY. 

 

Particularly like the  bravado orientated, precursor "Shout-up" type generalised response

 

In the absence of personal experience, or the application of pre-conceived prejudice, please advise me and the wider audience how a rational assessment could have been made any quicker ? The motor manufacturers don't exactly fall over themselves providing updated usuage information for older/historic marques where technology e.g. fuels, batteries changes during the lifetime of of the vehicle - as the recent response of Skoda Customer Services to my simple technical enquiry and the multiple and continuing new threads on these fora evidences.

 

 

And, believe it or not, my impression is that there are even some contributors on here, ostenibly a tariff-free information exchange, who absolutely love keeping their cards flush against their chests.

 

Postscript

 

And if the data output from the vehicle management technology on my car is adequate for making timely assessments of component failure modes,  where the technology has changed since the vehicle was designed, why did VAG spend R&D developing and installing the BEM system on later marques.

 

 

N

Edited 2 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[rum4mo]

Since I'm a project guy results take priority over process, I'm always looking for shortcuts because there are deadlines and budgets to meet, paperwork is the enemy of practical progress.

You two sound institutionalised to my delicate ears, I've learned to selectively ignore the hum, click and buzz of career administrators in order to get things done.

I worked in test areas and at the end of the day, even if you relatively speaking performed miracles, nothing got delivered without all paperwork packages been completed and that meant delivery targets were missed and penalty clauses applied if necessary. There were no "short cut heroes" in that company or I'd think in any other company that made money out of delivering hardware to a rightfully demanding customer. Failure to get it right in a contracting (ie not expanding) specialist trading area just meant losing your right to tender to supply in the future. Paperwork was not my best subject, just a necessary bit of the job as any formal paperwork could be the subject of audit both by internal and external auditors.

[rum4mo]

Clunkclick, the BEM "thing" is not just VAG, I think that it is appearing everywhere as part of the drive to be seen to improve emissions/energy use, ie for lack of a better phrase, "regenerative braking" and Stop/Start.

 

Fault Diagnosing And Locating System (FDLS) has been around for years as has Built In Test (BIT) facilities, in the cheap and cheery domestic product market, including cars, it is at its best where labour rates are high and assembly costs are low especially where a tech checks for which assembly is faulty, grabs and fits a new one and drops the faulty assembly in the bin on the way out the door, well maybe not quite as waste control laws might limit that way of working! Trouble is, FDLS and BIT do not always point to the root cause of the problems, so after a "first pass" by a dummy with a code reader/scan tool, the real work to sort things has just began.  I gave in with the battery drain issue with the 2009 Ibiza, handed it in to a SEAT main dealer who assigned "sorting it" to the master tech (small dealership) - he thought that he was using my money wisely and after a about a week diagnosed what he said was the root cause of this drain, ordered the part, fitted it, car seemed okay while I checked it over the following month, then it was used regularly like some people do with their cars for a month then  - and two months later, on the face of it I'm back to where I started - though maybe now another fault which has identical effect on the car's battery!  So even those people employed to fault find these cars can get it wrong - but the customer will need to pay for further fault finding, or like your A/C issue consider forgetting about it! I wanted to pay a minimum amount of money to get the BCM's software checked as a lot of these cars of that age needed an update to get the BCM, which does control which supplies stay live and which supplies sleep when the car is not being used to operate in a consistent manner and avoid unnecessary battery drain - main dealers do not work like that, they have a structure way to solve most problems and maybe after my wallet is empty they then check BCM software - who knows!!

Edited 2 October, 2016 by rum4mo

[Clunkclick]

Although the Re-charge/Re-condition of the existing Varta battery on the C-Tek is looking good (Stage 6 green light on the C-Tek) and the Foxwell battery analyser is showing  13.4 volts, 603CCA, 100 SOC and 83% SOH off-charge, I'm not expecting, as before, that, when installed, it will hold the top 25% of its capacity i.e. about 15 amp hours/150 CCA.

 

So this will be relegated to Reserve and camping duties and I've ordered a new S5 Bosch, about £20 more expensive than the identically specified D15 Varta, which is supposed to have better resistance to degradation caused by short-journies ( 3 star (Top)  rating on this characteristic in the  Official Bosch comparator).

 

In the event, even taking this extra precaution, may count for naught as I've read, that Lead/calcium batteries are more susceptible to  permanent damage  and  irrecoverable permanent loss of capacity if they are allowed to discharge.

 

As selpulchrave posted earlier, all the calcium additive does is keep the battery in a good state when its on the suppliers shelves and it would seem his statement about my battery being scrap, is on the button.

 

Varta's advice to suppliers is that batteries shouldn't be kept on the shelves for more than 15 months after manufacture and should be top-up charged at a minimum of every six months.

 

During disuse they recommend a mains based  re-charge when the voltage gets down to 12.5volts (Half way between 75 to 100% of full charge)

 

http://www.varta-automotive.com/en-gb/support/battery-safety-maintenance/maintenance/

 

This, in effect, makes the warranties on calcium batteries worthless. One  extended period when the voltage slips below 12.5 volts and effectively you're battery is kittened. And i take it that there's no warning message going to appear in the instrument binnacle to warn of this possibility ?

 

The section on calcium batteries, here, says it all:-

 

http://www.manbat.co.uk/about-batteries/

 

 

You never had to go to this level of inconvenience with Lead/antinomy batteries to keep them the right side of serviceable and, if well looked after, they would last the full 5-6 years or longer.

 

Lead/calcium - another marketing dodge ? Judging by the average battery price on line i.e. about £50, and given  the length of time mine lasted i.e. about 31 months, do I take it that someone in the hallowed halls of battery marketing has decided that they want a constant income of about £20 per annum from consumers, come hell or Hoboken ?
 

 

Postscript - LOL

 

Just out of interest I contacted the local Varta supplier (As listed on Varta's web site) to see if they could test my existing battery and, if necessary, supply a replacement. The answer that came back .

 

Answer 1: Oh yeah we can test it, but there won't be a printout. We'll just do a handwritten "Statement" - needless to say Varta marketing, on their website, have a campaign on to get all suppliers to test customers batteries on a precautionary basis, whether faulty or not, using State-Of-the-art equipment. 

 

Answer 2: We're having trouble getting Varta batteries. We can do you a Duracell. (obviously the on-line suppliers are gobbling up the supply

 

Me: ROFL.

 

Who needs early-onset geriatric urinary incontinence when you've got these people around !

 

And I thought joined-up government was hopeless.

 

 

Nick

Edited 3 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[rum4mo]

Ah well now you will have adequate supplies of stored 12V power which might come in handy if you have any mains power cuts this winter! You'll just need to keep on top of topping them up. I used to have some weird fetish for holding on to old batteries that had let me down, but I seem to have grown out of that, though I still have the Ibiza's original battery which I keep topped up in case of mains failure - CTEK battery analyser confirmed that that one was well down on CCA, less than 40% of quoted CCA when new.

 

Unfortunately, I think that you will still be experiencing starting trouble, though maybe with lower frequency as your battery will now be 100% - due to other drain issues, which you should address.

 

Prior to leaving the Ibiza parked at the airport for a week, I lazily made no attempt to make sure that I was leaving it with its battery fully charged, in fact, thinking back, I seem to remember using it a few times on very short journeys before driving 12 or so miles to the airport! After finding that it had discharged too far to start that car on return from holiday, I simply drove the 12 or so miles home, dumped our luggage and then drove about 15 miles, stopped for lunch then drove back home the 15 or so miles. After leaving it a week I found that it had discharged but managed to start the car, then probably did another almost 30 miles round trip. This Saturday it was taken again on a 20 or so mile round trip on return it was not fully charged, the next day we went out for about a 75 mile round trip, on return it did look like the battery was close on fully charged.  I'm writing all this really to press the point that after leaving a modern car unused for a week, it needs a bit more than a 10 mile trip to sort out the battery, I've been using a multimeter connected to the cigarette lighter socket to assess charging and initial and final battery voltages, especially important to me as that Ibiza does still seem to have an intermittent battery drain problem.

[Clunkclick]

Fetsih/semtish - Its got business potentail.  If I get any more partially failed calcium batteries I'll be able to go off mains !

 

Thing is the failed battery when its regularly top-up charged, sans convenience unit and alarm drains, it holds its charge and can easily start the car .

 

I'll be making more use of the dashboard voltage meter, making sure i use the car at least once a week and doing an as required recharge from the mains when the resting voltage nears 12.5v.

 

 

N

Edited 3 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[rum4mo]

Maybe write a letter to Varta UK and send it "signed for" to see what their take is on your local Duracell agent! 

 

I think if you are using an accurate voltmeter to monitor your new battery "resting voltage", you will find that it will slip below 12.5V quite a lot of the time.

[Clunkclick]

Maybe write a letter to Varta UK and send it "signed for" to see what their take is on your local Duracell agent! 

 

I think if you are using an accurate voltmeter to monitor your new battery "resting voltage", you will find that it will slip below 12.5V quite a lot of the time.

Yeah, full of those tricks.

 

I got enough to do with  tortuous and prolonged medical treatment and predatory  incomer buy-to-let landlords and their aiders and abettors. Thanks all the same.

 

On this occasion, its Marketeer, heal thyself  and is one of the few rare occasions where "Der market" has provided a possible solution - A new Bosch battery.

 

Even if I did write, I'd probably get the "I see no ships response" - a main dealer unable to get supplies of his franchised product ?- what does that say.  Either Varta are flogging the majority of their UK supply to on-line suppliers and/or the terms that they are offering local suppliers are so **** poor that the local suppliers either run multiple franchises or get stuff in wholesale.

 

Guess who's living in the marketing bubble.

 

N

Edited 4 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[Clunkclick]

New S5 Bosch battery arrived today. (Order Monday PM). 

 

The paper instruction booklet says only install the battery if the voltage is equal or above 12.5 Volts and to recharge the battery if the voltage reads 12.3 volts or below (Same advice as in the comparable Varta booklet)

 

And a self adhesive pictogram label on the side of the battery  implies the re-charge level is 12.4 Volts.

 

 

Foxwell  battery analyser says:-

 

Good battery

 

Volts     12.6

CCA      621

Rated    610

SOC:     100%

SOH:     85%

 

Why would the SOH i.e. the capacity only be 85% on a new battery ?

 

I've stuck it on the C-Tek MXS-5 and after 20 minutes it still on Stage 4 (Bulk charge), hmmm.

 

Will I see the SOH percentage improve ?

 

Postscript

 

I note that Varta  battery booklet has Johnson controls printed on the front page, whereas the Bosch battery booklet contains no reference to Johnson Controls . . . . . . . . .  But I thought Varta actually made Bosch batteries in the same factory. Is it a diferent production line and battery spec ? - One for Pistonheads.

 

Nick

 

 

[sepulchrave]

Why would the SOH i.e. the capacity only be 85% on a new battery ?

 

Because those analysers are crap and aren't to be trusted, Lead acid battery chemistry is complex, since you're bored start here:

 

http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/

[Clunkclick]

Get away !

 

On the other hand £1300 for a Spectro would be just a shade on the tasty side for a single user and even a group buy.

 

You got a Spectro or similar ?

 

Interestingly, the C-Tek  MXS -5 has now been charging the new Bosch for about 8.5 hours continuously and is still on stage 4 (Absorption) (Where it started  at 14:00)  and is charging at 14.4 Volts (C-Tek's  state this is the target rate at this stage).

 

C-Tek state in their manual that the battery should only be on this stage for  8  hours. 

 

I read somewhere that the average car battery, in good condition, should reach 70% charge within 7 - 10 hours of starting to charge  from fully depleted and will then take a further 7 hours to make up the remaining 30%. 

 

Let's hope I see a green light (Stage 7 - fully charged) tomorrow morning.

 

I wondering if  a charger with 5 amps  max output is really adequate for a 63 amp hour battery,  as various sources, including the Battery University site, state that a battery should be charged at 10% of its amp -hour capacity for the first couple of hours.

 

 

Nick

 

 

 

 

[rum4mo]

I realise that CTEK did not invent the universe, but I thought that somewhere in their chargers application listing there is a guide to which "size" battery needs which charger - roughly speaking.

I'd also reckon that when you received that battery it would have been a bit below fully charged as I'd doubt if any battery vendor gives their batteries a quick "poke" with a charger as they are going out the door, probably not a good plan if that battery is about to go in transit!

So, by now I'm confident that your CTEK has backed off and if you check that battery maybe a couple of hours after removing the CTEK, it will test at as near damn it 100% charged, probably with a CCA of slightly over the rated value - well that is my guess!

 

Edit:- normally, assuming that there is still some life in a battery, the worry is that someone will stick a "big" charger on a "small" battery - and so a warning is sometimes given about constant maximum recharge rate, though as it will get recharged quite quickly when used in a car etc - but over a short time and most battery chargers are smart, this should now be less of a worry?

Edited 6 October, 2016 by rum4mo

[Clunkclick]

In addition to the cardboard box outer and blown polystrenne sheet liners, the battery was received double wrapped - Polyester woven sheet sealed bag as the inner and a polythene bag with an in built plastic vent and a freezer bag zip-loc seal as an outer. So the chances of it receiving a pre-despatch boost were possible minimal.

 

Out-of-the- box it,  the battery analyser read "Good battery", 100% charged, with the battery health 85%, 12.60 volts, 621 CCA (Rated 610CCA).

 

And after 12 hours on charge yesterday, a 6 hour break over night followed by 3 hours charging this morning, the C-Tek finally reached the "Float" stage (Stage 7), green light on. C-Tek manual says it can be left on charge at this stage for up to 10 days !  I think I may limit that that to 48 hours. Should be good to go then.

 

At 13:00, Foxwell showed "Good battery",  100% charged, battery health 84% (!) and 608 CCA (!!).

 

I don't think the algorhythms/formulae  in the Foxwell have got things quite right !!!..

 

I think with the battery drain issue,  as yet unresolved, I'll just reinstall the old battery pro-temp. The old battery is now fully charged and  is showing  better stats on the Foxwell than the new battery ! viz:- 100% SOC, 86% SOH, 13.17 volts and 625 CCA (rated 610 CCA)

 

But before doing so, I'll leave it uninstalled for a week or so, just to see whether it loses its charge spontaneously, without external drains acting on it. That might give me an indication as to  existence and  scale of the drain when installed. And, hopefully next  week, I'll be in possession of a set of tester leads which can be plugged into the  bayonnet sockets for the fuses, so that the  source of the drain can be narrowed down.

 

 

 

Nick

Edited 6 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[Clunkclick]

The  C-Tek MXS 5.0, for ordinary "Flooded" batteries is rated as capable of charging batteries from 14Ah to 140 Ah capacity.

 

But, its max output is 5 A, so god knows how long it would take to charge a fully depleted 140 Ah, bearing in mind it took 25% longer than the simple battery rating indicates to fully charge my Bosch battery i.e. 63 AH should take 12.5 hours to charge @ 5 amps, but, in reality it took 15 hours (Despite the fact that, on the Foxwell stats, the battery out-of-the-box was already  showing fully charged.).

 

My concern is that a  5 amp battery charger hasn't got enough "Push" or any battery size over 50 amp hours.

 

How can a battery charger  which is limited to a maximum charge rate of 5  Amp hour possibly supply the maximum charge of 10% of  total battery capacity recommended by most sources  for the first stage of charging, in the case batteries with a capacity of over 50 Amp hour  ?

 

I understand that C-Tek do a 7 amp charger, as well as a 10 amp - the latter being used by garages ?

 

 

Nick

 

 

[rum4mo]

Not fair we want to see this new battery getting discharged!

 

Anyway, CTEK well this range of chargers, I've always looked on them as being maintenance chargers and not for just recharging batteries that might be used in a situation where there is no onboard provision for recharging.

 

After using the Ibiza on Sunday for a 78 mile round trip, only stopping twice, at the end of that trip I left the car an hour then checked the battery voltage - it was 12.65V, I left it out of use until today, I unlocked it and checked the battery voltage after the fuel pump had stopped running, it was 11.84V - but the car started up okay, unfortunately I needed to travel only a total of 1.5 miles with two stops, so now it is back on charge to avoid another disappointment in a few days time, overnight temperatures, last night, did not drop to zero.

 

I have a couple of these current leads for both of the small fuses models, never used them - yet, my next plan should be, to locate the BCM and work out which plugs feed which load and remove them one at  a time and leave the car some unknown amount of time, what a rotten plan! It is either that or demand that SEAT, at my expensive, check and re-flash the BCM operating software, so that equates to just reflashing it with the latest version I'd guess, then another waiting period to see if things improve - bother bother bother!

Edited 6 October, 2016 by rum4mo

[Clunkclick]

Put the new Bosch battery back on charge about a hour ago (Left off charge 02:00-08:30) and the C- Tek re-established the Stage 7, green light (Floatation) within 40 minutes. That looks to me sound as a pound - sorry to disappoint !

 

In comparison, the old Varta (Say that with your fingers extruding your mouth), even though apparently fully charged, takes 3 -4 hours to re-establish stage 7. That suggests to me that the battery is spontaneously  loosing charge whilst standing. I think it will gaining reserve/camping battery status, once I've re- tested the  car circuitry for a drain.

 

It seems to me that these batteries are in different states,  one suitable for sustained normal future use and one which is initially fit for use but can't maintain that state. And it also appears that the Battery analyser can't really distinguish between these states.. 

 

It would seem, despite all the "Technical advances" in battery technology over the last 30 years, its even more difficult for the ordinary user to determine if a battery is still fit for use.

 

As I said earlier, the battery design of  batteries of 30 years ago allowed you to test the electrolyte using  a hydrometer and once, following re-charging, each of these cells had been tested, the acidity levels of the electrolyte in each cell CLEARLY showed, which cell or cells hadn't responded to the re-charge. And that made the decision to either retain or dispose simple simon.

 

Clearly, the cheapo battery analysers, prima facie, haven't got what it takes to distinguish between the two battery states I've referred to above i.e. the Foxwell is showing both batteries with Voltages, Cold Cranking Amps and State of Charge at "Textbook" fully charged levels and is showing the state of health of both as within 1% of each other in the mid 80s.

 

In order to restore the level of customer utility to what was it was 30 years ago. Given that the value of the cell electrolyte was good at providing a definitive "Go"/"No Go" decision perhaps they could  add a luminescent dye in the electrolyte which glowed when the cell electrolyte was in a fully charged state - in the case of the German branded batteries at least, you'd be able to see the glow through the casing. I'm not sure, but is that what the "Magic Eyes" , which now appear to have been discarded, used to do ?

 

I also wonder why the battery arrived showing a State of Health of 85% on the battery analyser. Is this an incorrect reading by the battery analyser ? Or  is it a valid reading and are there factors in the design/construction/operation of the battery which prevent it from reaching 100% ? If so, is this the standard across the industry ?

 

Lastly does anyone know if there is a way to validate the battery analyser readings using formulae + readings from a multimeter ?

 

 

Nick

 

 

 

 

 

[rum4mo]

No, what I meant was "we want to see this new battery discharging (while fitted to that car)".

 

Anyway, 85% as opposed to 100% - if it was me, I would put that down to that battery just needing a slight top up charge to bring it back 100% which, all things being equal, it will drop away from slowly with time as that battery attempts to reach its stable ground state with a PD of zero volts across its terminals - eventually.

[Clunkclick]

Slight  modification/retraction of  what I've said above.

 

I've just realised that I have been using the wrong standard on the battery analyser to measure Cold Cranking Amps. Duh !

 

Labels on both the Bosch and Varta state the Cold Cranking Amps  with reference to the EN standard, whereas I had been setting up the battery analyser on the CCA standard.

 

So, resetting the analyser and re-testing off-charge yields the following:-

 

New Bosch battery

 

13.17 volts

571 EN (Rated 610)

100% SOC

79%   SOH

 

 

Old Varta battery

 

13.46 volts

556 EN (Rated 610)

100% SOC

76%   SOH

 

Using the correct CCA standard makes the new battery health look even worse.

 

 So, it would appear that the battery analyser can distinguish between the battery states, even when they are each fully charged. But, the difference is so marginal, that if you didn't know the history, you really couldn't spot the difference between them. Even if you translate the Cold Cranking Amps into watts using the stated voltages, there's no real difference.

 

Postscript

 

Anybody know where the date of manufacture is stated on Bosch or Varta batteries ?

 

N

Edited 7 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[rum4mo]

Oh bother, still "we want to see that new battery discharging in that car"! (sorry)  If only to prove a point!

 

I was a bit jealous of all the options/readout modes you can get from your Foxwell BT100 compared to my CTEK, but now that you are having "problems" with it, I'll just be happy that the CTEK comes with no options, it is sold into both markets and configured for the market it is being sold into, so no confusion!

[Clunkclick]

Oh bother, still "we want to see that new battery discharging in that car"! (sorry)  If only to prove a point!

 

I was a bit jealous of all the options/readout modes you can get from your Foxwell BT100 compared to my CTEK, but now that you are having "problems" with it, I'll just be happy that the CTEK comes with no options, it is sold into both markets and configured for the market it is being sold into, so no confusion!

When mine arrived, the default setting was Spanish !  = same (Euro) standard ? And it gave me the option to reset to English.

Which I did.

 

I think I have found and managed to decode the date of manufacture (Or is it despatch ?) of the battery - its a series of alpha numerics which appears to be heat printed using a dot matrix head (Possibly lasered) into the plastic case next to  the negative terminal (Underneath the LHS of the handle, when flat):-

 

New Bosch battery 

 

07G619182 3390 536036

 

MCJB next to the positive terminal -i that the distributor's top-up charge code ?

 

http://mechanics.stackexchange.com/questions/2814/how-do-i-know-when-a-car-battery-was-produced

 

http://aa-boschap-ru.resource.bosch.com/media/commonly_used_media/parts/repairs_and_service/_01072015.pdf

 

According to the above sources, ignore the first three letters from the left, its the next three that are important.

 

So, 619, in my case, which according to the Ruski look-up table makes it March 2016. It would appear to be within the shelf life of 15 months.

 

. . . . and the slough of despond's response is . . . ?

 

 

Nick

Edited 7 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[Clunkclick]

Similarly, the Varta has a code embossed on the top RHS of the upper case (Above the + ve terminal)

 

Mine says 

 

E4C312042 0784 536036 Y63

 

So, 312 is of relevance, which, again, according to the look-up table is Dec 2013.

 

That would make sense as the battery was purchased in February 2014.

 

But, unfortunatetly, it still doesn't answer the question why the low state of health when new.

 

(He's gone away to look up slough of despond, hasn't he)

 

 

Nick

Edited 7 October, 2016 by Clunkclick

[rum4mo]

I'd still be satisfied with what was delivered to you, what you have bought is an energy storage unit which, to meet its spec, needs to be able to store the Amp hours stated and deliver over a specified temperature range, the CCA stated.  You could almost take the line that the stored energy in that battery, comes as a FOC bonus, though selling filled new batteries with little or no stored energy would not be smart for the battery's future life or the customer who mainly is buying a battery as his old one is stuffed, so he needs an out of the box fix.

Edited 7 October, 2016 by rum4mo

[rum4mo]

Sorry, I seem to have been preoccupied by the possibility of that battery being delivered not quite in peak SOC, so no, one answer could be round about that has been said before about DIYer priced battery analysers, in your case it might revolve around the conversion to European standards, I seem to remember that the CTEK one as well as being configurated for the market it is being sold into, also came with a rough conversion chart. BTW, the CTEK unit is not Scandi, it is an American one built for CTEK for both markets.

[sepulchrave]

I say, my dog's got no nose...

[TMB]

^ How does it smell?