Car Lead acid battery sudden failure mechanism

[blackolive (Ste)]

Nissan Navara Diesel. Absolutely none of the usual symptoms of a failing battery, but last night came to start it up, click, and the aircon panel and radio went off while the key was being turned.

voltage off load was 12.2 but went down to about 10 when cranking.

jump started ok from another car.

fitted a new uprated silver jobby with a 5 year guarantee. yes I paid more from Halfords than the internet but not much when I factor in my buggerance time waiting for one to be delivered off the internet.

it looks like the old one has a date stamp of 2010, and to be fair its had some hammer over the winters and playing radio etc, but was just wondering why the seem to suddenly fail nowadays instead of "graceful degradation", or is it just that a modern car with an ECU will switch stuff off if the voltage drops below a certain point ?

 

[slim_boy_fat]

That's how they fail now - one day fine, next.....dead. If you've had 9 years out of the old one you've done well.

 

[Cuthy246]

Lots of detail on how batteries work/fail

 

[daleyd]

It happened to my qashaqi last year - it very slightly hesitated in the morning when I took my daughter to school, went to use it in the afternoon and nothing!!

 

[Pigeon_Droppings2]

I find if they are allowed to completely or almost completely drain at any point then they are basically toast.

Personally if in doubt I generally remove and fit a new one. I know that many people discuss "restoring" old batteries but I've had one explode on me (luckily I was no where near it)....but the mess it creates is just not worth the risk.

I've had good luck with the AGM type batteries...they seem to not mind being depleted as much as the lead acid ones....cost more though!

 

[Paul.]

Sudden death of batteries seems to be a "feature" of them nowadays, my wife drove to a local supermarket and parked up, realised she had left the window open a touch so turned the ignition on and the battery was dead, not even enough to light the dash up, AA man said they see loads of them exactly the same.

 

[Seadog]

My Merc did that. too. Starter motor also died overnight with no signs of ever struggling up to that point.

 

[Kayos]

My Disco did the same, slightly slow to turn over in the morning, set off from job and it was dead. Luckily customer was a smallholder and had a selection of industrial looking batteries in his barn, it just fitted but it's been a cracker

 

[voipio]

The intercell links can fracture and are difficult to repair. There is usually little or no warning of impending failure.

 

[Robotstar5]

Mine gives me advanced warning due to a manufacturing fault for about a 6 month build period the ESP monitoring system had components with too tight a tolerance which caused an ESP fault message if the battery voltage dropped slightly, Suzuki even issued a TSB (technical service bulletin) detailing the replacement part to be fitted under warranty.

This normally appeared during the winter, but after a couple of years started to appear during the summer then a couple of years ago it appeared all the time so I changed the battery, haven't seen it since.

 

[CompoSimmonite]

I always buy batteries on-line (from https://www.tayna.co.uk/) and they are delivered the next day

 

[Robotstar5]

I always buy batteries on-line (from https://www.tayna.co.uk/) and they are delivered the next day

I've bought a few from the Battery Megastore and found them pretty competitive on pricing.

 

[Melvyn Best]

Not a new problem, in the early 70s Lucas had a battery called Pacemaker that would fail on brand new cars before they even got to be PDId , normally fitted to BMC cars

 

[Screwdriver]

I rather suspect they don't make 'em like they used to. You used to get a solid sheet of lead (which has its own issues) and these days more likely to be a delicate matrix of lead and padding/reinforcing. With a sudden failure it's most likely a physical issue like a broken plate assuming mfrs have fixed the possibility of a plate shorting internally.

Epsom salts do not work unless they are used to wash out the battery prior to replacing the acid.

 

[earthman]

My wife's car battery suddenly failed like that too, she didn't even get the lights on the dash to come on let alone any signs of the starter motor to turn, I've never experienced a battery to fail like that before. It's a 13 plate so the battery were no older than 6 years, they sure don't make batteries like they use to.

 

[pedrobedro]

voltage off load was 12.2 but went down to about 10 when cranking.

Needs to be around 12.6 or higher to start, anything below 12.5 is borderline and 12.2 is a flat battery. My niece had left her car on the drive and not looked at it for 3 months so the battery was dead showing 10v so a smart charger would not look at it. I put it on my 12 amp charger on high for a couple of hours then turned it down and left it overnight and it held it's charge next day which I didn't really expect.

 

[Pigeon_Droppings2]

I put it on my 12 amp charger on high for a couple of hours then turned it down and left it overnight and it held it's charge next day which I didn't really expect.

With modern batteries I find once they've gone flat they are basically never the same....a few have taken a recharge but they seem to go down hill quickly. I tent to buy AGM replacements...they don't suffer as badly I think.

 

[bricol]

Haven't they always done it? Drove my Alfa 75 to work at THF one night back in 1992 .. came out - dead. Wouldn't hold a charge.

 

[rikrobson]

Our nissan xtrail did the same on a 10 year oldbattery5hatwhen tested was at 68% capacity.
Got a new battery and its all good

 

[blackolive (Ste)]

sounds like they all die horribly nowadays then.

its a bit overkill but if the old battery will take a trickle charge for the solar it will be used to run the fence energiser, because Im sure if I dont fence the bottom of the paddock off before the grass gets sparse River will live up to his name again and be in the brook