Hi, I’m about to change the battery in my Skoda superb mkii - are there any specific precautions to take or procedures to follow?

 

thanks in advance.

With or without stop start one is more involved than the other. 

No stop start.

On my 2011 TDI 170. I just swapped it for a 096 or similar as I also don’t have stop start. I don’t believe any coding needed. I am sure others will be along shortly to confirm if this is correct. 

Easy swap then. You'll get some warning lights on for steering and esp but drive a few yards and it'll be sorted. 

On 17/04/2020 at 18:09, rover220 said:

Easy swap then. You'll get some warning lights on for steering and esp but drive a few yards and it'll be sorted. 

Like many folks I suspect, I haven't driven my Superb for more than 35 days. When I opened the car today I heard the dreaded soft chimes of the low battery warning. The car's a 2013 reg, so a new battery might be needed. I had imagined I might have to find a way to keep a 12v supply on the car while the battery got changed. But it seems like I could just take out the old and put a new one in, naturally taking the normal precautions to keep all the power in the battery and not allow any short circuits!!

 

Have I interpreted your above giudance correctly?

 

Thanks.

2 minutes ago, happyclappy65 said:

Like many folks I suspect, I haven't driven my Superb for more than 35 days. When I opened the car today I heard the dreaded soft chimes of the low battery warning. The car's a 2013 reg, so a new battery might be needed. I had imagined I might have to find a way to keep a 12v supply on the car while the battery got changed. But it seems like I could just take out the old and put a new one in, naturally taking the normal precautions to keep all the power in the battery and not allow any short circuits!!

 

Have I interpreted your above giudance correctly?

 

Thanks.

Do you have stop start? 

1 minute ago, rover220 said:

Do you have stop start? 

 

Nope. Just a plain vanilla estate. 🙂

12 minutes ago, happyclappy65 said:

 

Nope. Just a plain vanilla estate. 🙂

Then yes it's straight forward swap. 

1 minute ago, rover220 said:

Then yes it's straight forward swap. 

 

Many thanks.

Just to syphon off a little more of your knowledge, does this also mean I could take the battery out of the vehicle and charge it? I'm reluctant to charge it on the car with the ancient battery charger I have because I have no idea about the quality of its output and would not want to screw up anything in my car's electronics.

Yes, you'll lose time settings etc but not the end of the world

Just now, rover220 said:

Yes, you'll lose time settings etc but not the end of the world

 

-> Thanks for your help and your instant responses. Much appreciated 🙂

On 24/04/2020 at 20:37, happyclappy65 said:

 

Many thanks.

Just to syphon off a little more of your knowledge, does this also mean I could take the battery out of the vehicle and charge it? I'm reluctant to charge it on the car with the ancient battery charger I have because I have no idea about the quality of its output and would not want to screw up anything in my car's electronics.

Almost inevitably with so little use over the last 10 weeks my battery is also drained (down to 4.2v according to my multimeter 😖).
 

I also have an ancient battery charger - was your battery an AGM variety @happyclappy65 and is so how did charging it go?

 

 Cheers,

 Steve

1 hour ago, spk said:

Almost inevitably with so little use over the last 10 weeks my battery is also drained (down to 4.2v according to my multimeter 😖).
 

I also have an ancient battery charger - was your battery an AGM variety @happyclappy65 and is so how did charging it go?

 

 Cheers,

 Steve

 

Hi Steve

 

Because my Superb is the base model it has a base model starter battery; just a plain old sealed lead acid. I too have an ancient battery charger; mine came from Halfords in the 1970's!! Although I have used the old charger in the past, it has laid dormant for many years. Being concerned that transients from it might damage expensive electronic bits in my car, I disconnected the battery earth and charged the battery on the car for several hours.

 

Earlier in the thread Rover220 wrote about losing the time and I also read about other warning lights appearing after the disconnected battery is reconnected. This is right, but the clock is easily reset and the warning lights disappear within a few seconds of driving away.

 

Just a couple of random thoughts. My car does not have a stop/start function, so does not object to having it's starter battery disconnected; the process for charging a battery on a stop/start car could be quite different. In addition, my battery was just over 12 v before the charging started, had just enough capacity to start the car, and seems to have recovered OK. If yours was at 4.2v, it is heavily discharged, could be damaged, and might not come back to any useful capacity.

 

Stay safe 🙂

HC

Thanks for the reply @happyclappy65 - mine is totally dead and non-start/stop however it's a v6 model so the battery is in the boot = has to be an AGM battery.

 

Anecdotal evidence seems to be that you can recover them but there's problems charging them from below 10.5v because a modern charger will see nothing connected. I've seen a few examples of people "tricking" the charger by connecting a good battery but don't really want to do that. If I'm going to need a second battery I may was well swap them over...but there seems little point in doing that until I have a solution in place to top the battery up.

 

Cheers,

Steve

 

P.S. Mine is a 70s or maybe even 80s Halford charger too! Was great on the old VW Golf GTi - maybe I should just buy an old car rather than a modern charger... 😀😉