on a Fabia 1.9 SDI?

My mileage is very low these days (<10K pa). Every six weeks or so I'm able to give the vehicle a nice long run of 400+ miles. This charges the battery OK, but the rest of the time it's just local runs that don't even get the car to normal operating temperatures.

This is OK when temperatures are mild but a week ago we'd experience some very cold days with heavy frosts. Went out to the car and not enough oomph to turn it over. Got a jump start from a friend and off on one of my 400+ mile trips. Battery fine at the moment starts first time etc but I don't really want to be faced with that again.

Saw the Black & Decker battery booster advertised on the box & wondered if anyone had experience of similar products & bearing in mind my car's a diesel what rating I should go for (they all seem to quote ranges of amperage (not ampere hours) of 800 - 1000 amps. Remember I only need this for topping up a depleted battery to get me going, not to charge the battery.

TIA

Not personally, but my fair weather biker mates all swear by this sort of battery saver product.

I also have a 1.9sdi , and do little mileage . I was having to charge the battery every 5 days. My car has an alarm and radio fitted ,both of which take a small amount of current about 125 milliamps (1000 miliamps equals 1 amp), all the time. I had problems with the power steering not working after starting , and solved problem by fitting a new top quality battery (VARTA BLUE). I can now leave the car for 2 weeks ,before any problems occur. If you dont know the age of your battery ,any battery over 4 years is suspect. I used to be in Industrial Electronics , and my advice is to get a small automatic charger ,fitted with a cigar plug to keep your battery up. It needs to give a maximum output of 1 to 2.5 amps .You dont need to but a Halfrauds 5 stage super duper one just one that ,limits the charge current to about 250 milliamps ,when connected to a fully charge battery.This amount overcomes the 125 milliamps drain, leaving 100 milliamps to overcome the self discharge of the battery. All lead Acid batteries have a self discharge amount ,more recent ones have better separators between the cell construction ,which lowers the self discharge current .

These chargers are on Ebay quite frequently .

You're probably better off going for a battery conditioner type charger that you can leave connected for extended periods of time. Halfrauds had one a while back for about £28 that did normal, VRLA and car and motorcycle as well... M/c batts are usually no more than 15 AH, so need TLC...

New battery is quite cheap and will probably do the trick.....or you could try one of those solar chargers to trickle charge the battery...they do work and are around £10 to £15 on ebay

If the battery is over 4-5 years old I'd be looking at a new battery first.

New battery is quite cheap and will probably do the trick.....or you could try one of those solar chargers to trickle charge the battery...they do work and are around £10 to £15 on ebay

Have you any experience of the solar chargers? I could do with a trickle charger for the Mazda as it only gets used once a fortnight or so at the moment but thought I'd go environmentally friendly and via the ciggie lighter than mains and via battery clamps.

car Solar Chargers only give about 100 to 150 milliamps (100 milliamps = 1/10 amp) out in bright sunlight. In Winter they give out next to nothing ,so I think they are not worth using, unless you pay about £30 to £40 for one with higher output.

Yeah I was going to measure the latent current from the battery (CD changer and radio + immobiliser) with a multi meter and then buy one to suit - was thinking a 2watt one (a50mA) might just do it but from what ou are saying maybe not in winter so something I need to check!

When I measured the current being taken when car not being used it measured

approx 0.15 amps (150 milliamps) with alarm off. With alarm on it measured approx 0.175 amps (175 milliamps). Any automatic charger on standby (having completed charge cycle) used needs to supply above this value ,when the battery is fully charged.

I use the Datatool maintenance charger on my classic car. It is primarily for motorbikes but does a great job of keeping the car battery in tiptop nick.

my friend uses solar trickle charger...not now after he once noticed someone was trying to get it from his car and he disturbed them, but they work nicely