So engine management light came on last night 🙁 As its under warranty, its booked back in with the dealer but It'll be a while before then and the battery has been warning me a lot recently on the stereo. Just in case it won't start after sitting for a while, was going to pick up a battery jump starter. Unfortunately where I have to park my car I can't even see it so trickle charging/removing the battery isn't possible/ideal.

 

If I was going to use one, as I have start-stop would it be positive lead to positive terminal then the negative/earth lead to the specific earthing point on the chassis as per the car manual, ignoring the jump starters manual which looks like it states the battery terminal?

If you are meaning that you will be using a slave battery type jump pack, yes, -VE to body earth bonding post beside battery -VE post.

 

If you are using a super capacitor type jump pack I can't say, but using the body earth would be my chosen point for the -VE side.

Was looking at https://www.amazon.co.uk/NOCO-GB20-UltraSafe-Lithium-Gasoline/dp/B015TKPT1A/ which looks like a slave battery from my understanding so +VE lead to +VE post on battery and -VE lead to body earth bonding post as pictured in the manual 👍 Thanks for clarifying. Hopefully won't be needed but planning ahead.

Have you ever looked at the youtube video about these compact jumper packs, they do seem to work and work and work - etc etc!

Nope I haven't, only knew they existed after a work colleague bought one after not using his car for a month during lockdown. Worked a charm apparently and a couple of times since.

If you get really really bored maybe Google what you have bought, the best and maybe only "big" youtube contributor for that jump pack seems to live in either Northern USA or Canada, oh and he did two reviews maybe a year apart, he still raves about them, so all good!

Is that Todd from PF?

 

Thanks AG Falco

Oh cool, good to know they review well. Kinda weird I didn't watch any reviews, I have a youtube premium family pass I make good use of and normally watch reviews of almost everything I purchase but for some reason I didn't on these 🤔 

I bought a GB70 version after they got one at work and used it extensively and were happy with it. Only used it to power a tyre inflator so far but it's waiting if I need it!

I have one similar to this.  The actual model I have seems no longer available.  It worked a treat when the three-year-old Moll on my Yeti died (replaced under warranty).

 

And yes... +ve to battery terminal and -ve to body earth bonding post.

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/BUTURE-Starter-20000mAh-Portable-Battery/dp/B083NVVXV2/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?dchild=1&hvadid=80264380400177&hvbmt=be&hvdev=c&hvqmt=e&keywords=18000mah+jump+starter&qid=1592727789&sr=8-1-spons&tag=mh0a9-21&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUExTFJaNjJZTFU3WDFNJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNTU2MTQzMjQwWUk2UjFJTkpYUyZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwMzI2MTI4MkcwMkg4NVZBU1JYWSZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU=

Thanks for the replies, reassuring they've worked for others 🙂. Have a gb50 on order from tayna, pretty reasonable with a code and the light/usb charging will be handy.

 

Not so reassuring your battery failed after less than 3 years though. My previous cars battery was over 10 years old before it started causing issues, this one was less than 4 before it started giving me warnings last year. Is in for a service and cam belt swap soon 🙈 so will see what the battery test says.

Someone I used to work with got one of these Buture jobbies, after buying a basic battery based jump pack, he thought that the battery based on took up too much room in the boot, so needed to buy this compact Buture one - I had suggested that buying the basic battery jump pack was just to get him out of trouble and like some other of his ex-work friends, what he needed to do was to get that car battery checked and replaced if it was the root cause of his problems and not lack of proper use of the car due to lockdown.

 

Well he got this Buture via Amazon, possibly misread the instructions or the Buture array of LEDs mean the opposite to all other devices, ie "full" array of LEDs lit = discharged, or so he said and found out, so first time he took it out with him, his car failed to start when he had completed his shopping and still the same with the Buture fitted!  That as you can imagine caused him much inconvenience and annoyance needing to get a jump start to get home - all this after handing over £50 + £80, so he charged the Buture and it worked very well very frequently so he did what he should have done after his first "failure to start" - and got a new battery branded as Dtech which not many people will have heard of, and it is extremely small, so now having spent £50 + £80 + £95 = £225 he has a car that currently starts first time and no doubt the Buture and Halfords basic battery based jump pack will be sitting in the garage, hummm, I wonder what next winter will bring for him, time will tell!

 

The other thing was to add to his misery was that the muppets in the Tyre and Battery place needed him to show them how to remove the battery and they did not use a memory saver which meant the remote lost its mind and needed to be reset when he got home, it could have been worse, he could have been in a hurry after getting that battery swopped, I sent him a link to Tayna to let him see how much a quality correct size battery costs, well I did that early on with the suggestion that he swopped the batteries himself.

Edited 21 June, 20205 yr by rum4mo

On 20/06/2020 at 15:01, AGFalco said:

Is that Todd from PF?

 

Thanks AG Falco

 

Maybe if he is the guy with the old Subarus and a VW badged Mitzi or Isuzu.

Ha what a faff. Not had any failures to start or any real sign it struggles at all so far... only the warning on the stereo which I'm not sure if its down to the battery or my lack of use. I live close to my work so its only driven 2-3 times a week. I make sure It gets a longer run on weekends and take longer ways back from work but who knows if that's enough. My previous car was fine with it but it didn't have start stop or any fancy battery control management stuff. Last time it was tested it had lost a reasonable amount of capacity but was still "good".

 

I'd happily replace it myself as I have before, but Its my understanding it requires a change in the computer to tell the battery control its a new battery even if its a direct replacement? Remember there being a long thread on here about it. Expensive business cars eh 😞 Crossing my fingers the warranty covers whatever made the engine management light come on as with the service, cam belt and possible battery my wallets already taking a beating.

1 hour ago, rum4mo said:

Maybe if he is the guy with the old Subarus and a VW badged Mitzi or Isuzu.

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2rzsm1Qi6N1X-wuOg_p0Ng

 

Todd from Project Farm.

 

 

58 minutes ago, Confused_Cheese said:

battery or my lack of use

 

Had a lot of car battery problems come in to work recently.

All down to lack of use.

Charge the battery with a smart charger first is what we try.

 

 

Thanks AG Falco

 

32 minutes ago, AGFalco said:

Charge the battery with a smart charger first is what we try

 

Might have to invest in one, just a bit of a pain where we live as no garage or driveway so its park out the front and partially block access for the neighbours or remove the battery which is a faff/no alarm. One of the guys at work uses a solar charger actually on his seat leon 🤔 think it trickle charges via the cigarette/12v port, could be an option but not sure how safe that is.

22 minutes ago, Confused_Cheese said:

where we live as no garage or driveway

 

What about at work?

 

Thanks AG Falco

Ah even worse, shared office building and car park not close by 🙈 sure it'll be fine out the front if I time it right, or can pop to the folks for a while. Guessing a smart charge will take a while, not sure how much talk about football I can stomach 😂

Solar chargers can work OK. But with limitations. Not all cigar lighter sockets are permanently connected so it's not always possible that way, but when I checked after a previous question the Furby 3 is. Small cheap panels don't have much output and although they will help may still struggle to keep up with the cars load if the weather is dull, and heading into winter. Bigger panels are great if you can get them in decent sun (my drive is to the North of the house) but you might need a charge controller to ensure you don't overcharge.

 

I use a solar panel on one of my older cars throughout the year because it gets little use, and funnily enough the older version of the same model has a switched cigar lighter so I can't do the same with that one. This time of year it has been keeping up, but over winter it needed topping up quite significantly from a smart charger.

3 hours ago, Confused_Cheese said:

 

Might have to invest in one, just a bit of a pain where we live as no garage or driveway so its park out the front and partially block access for the neighbours or remove the battery which is a faff/no alarm. One of the guys at work uses a solar charger actually on his seat leon 🤔 think it trickle charges via the cigarette/12v port, could be an option but not sure how safe that is.

 

He probably uses a solar charger via the OBD2 port as the ciggy lighter socket on SEATs are not powered when the ignition is off, but that would also work on your Skoda, or via the ciggy lighter socket, though make sure that you buy a "good" sized one as the sun has a bad habit of moving and so the solar cell will not be receiving anything like direct sunlight much of the time, I tried one with a SEAT Ibiza but that car had a higher than usual current drain, so that did not keep up with that, Halfords do/did two "sizes" and the higher max output version  might work okay.

 

Proper pain in the bum if you can't charge it up from mains though.

4 hours ago, AGFalco said:

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2rzsm1Qi6N1X-wuOg_p0Ng

 

Todd from Project.

 

Thanks AG Falco

 

No not him, maybe it was a trader as he had access to a large number of older cars with discharged batteries.

 

Edit:- this is the one!             

 

 

Edited 21 June, 20205 yr by rum4mo

12 minutes ago, rum4mo said:

Proper pain in the bum if you can't charge it up from mains though

Yeah it's a bit of a pain. Would love an ev at some point but not really ideal where we are at the moment. Used to mow the patch of grass we own next to the spaces with a 25 metre extension... That lasted about 3 months before I dug it up and gravelled it all lol hopefully be moving on in the not too distant future