Dead Battery

[gilessav]

Afternoon all,

Annoyingly just went to take the car for a spin and the battery is dead.

Could open the doors and all the lights etc worked, but when trying to turn over just got a very rapid clicking and flickering of the dash lights and the window's reacting slightly, the trip meter has also reset itself. It did not even try and turn over effectively.

Obvious culprit is the flat battery but strangely this has been on a CTEK 5.0 charger at all times (via cig lighter as live on the C4s) and as a Bosch S5 (110ah) and only 5 months old that seems strange. The CTEK was showing it at stage 7-8 (i.e. fully charged and maintained) but now plugged back in via the trunk via that connector its back to phase 1 charging which it normally flies past if the battery is in any way charged. I've not used the car in the last 2 weeks through this cold snap but its garaged and should be no issue if the CTEK is doing its job.

So, i'll leave to charge and see if it recovers, anyone else has issue with a CTEK giving false information before I go rushing off to swap the battery under warranty....or could these symptoms point to starter motor (never been particularly slow starting before) :?:

 

[Alex]

If your other electric stuff is showing the battery as down (what's the voltmeter in the car showing?) then its most likely the battery. Earth strap can sometimes be at fault if its struggling turning. Just as a quick check, if you have jump leads, try connecting the engine to the chassis with one of the leads so you get a better earth and then try turning again.

 

[gilessav]

Thanks Alex will check the car's volt meter in the am.

Been on charge for 4odd hours and still stuck at level 1 (de-sulphate) so no idea why the CTEK was showing fully charged and float charging before I tried to start her. Its never stayed at 1 for more than a few minutes so I'm pretty sure its a flat battery just trying to work out why the CTEK has failed to maintain the battery, cold or otherwise! will report back, cheers.

 

[Pickse]

I had a similar indication from my ctek last week when connected to my 996T.
It sat on one light for two hours.
I was beginning to wonder if it was falling so I put it on another battery. It stepped through to 3 lights in seconds so I reconnected it to my car and it moved on to three lights in just a few seconds.

Not at all sure why it would behave this way but maybe disconnect/reconnect ?

 

[gilessav]

Cheers all.

plot thickens as it was still stuck on 1 but when I then gently wiggled the connector between the charger and the 1m extension cable mating it suddenly jumped to 3 on the charge.

also notice that the male/female clip/join between the above is getting warm/hot and that surely can't be right? do others get a kind of 'current static' like sounds coming from their unit when charging?

I'm beginning to think that the unit or the extension lead is fubar and that its given a charged reading when it clearly was not. letting the unit and leads cool down and am going to bypass the 1M extension and see if plugging the charger into the short connector lead for the cig lighter generates any heat; if not point to a faulty extension I suspect. Again will report back but seems to point at CTEK at the moment.....

 

[NickHappy]

Cheers all.

plot thickens as it was still stuck on 1 but when I then gently wiggled the connector between the charger and the 1m extension cable mating it suddenly jumped to 3 on the charge.

also notice that the male/female clip/join between the above is getting warm/hot and that surely can't be right? do others get a kind of 'current static' like sounds coming from their unit when charging?

I'm beginning to think that the unit or the extension lead is fubar and that its given a charged reading when it clearly was not. letting the unit and leads cool down and am going to bypass the 1M extension and see if plugging the charger into the short connector lead for the cig lighter generates any heat; if not point to a faulty extension I suspect. Again will report back but seems to point at CTEK at the moment.....

Hi Gilesav,

Any update on this - sounds very similar to issues I'm having but I've gone and bought a new battery thinking that was the issue!!

And it appears not.

Cheers

NH