Battery Reconditioning: Is Your Car Battery Dead?
Battery reconditioning is something most people are ignorant about when their batteries that matter most die. Left with no choice, they have to buy a new one to replace it, or you’re unable to use it. Simple as that.
Without your car battery, it will render your vehicle useless. One wouldn’t expect your car battery to pass out too soon as you’ve thought that you’ve just bought it, but you’re just the unlucky one.
From car to cellphone, and everything in between any electrical and electronic devices needs juices to function. If your battery dies unexpectedly, nothing to be get done. You couldn’t book your e-hailing service, you couldn’t submit your school’s assignment, your car couldn’t start and you couldn’t drive to your appointment, all because of a failed battery.
But don’t worry, there are signs that show when your car’s battery is dying. Most people who don’t know about battery reconditioning will replace them with a new one. Learn more about it here.
There are major critical signs you should look out for.
Before we show you these major critical signs, let’s check your battery whether they are connected properly and the cables are not broken. Most of the time, there seems to be a bigger problem arising from a faulty connection.
Cranking Start
Not discounting your car’s starter or the electrical system, failure, it could be your car battery at fault if your car takes far longer than it takes normally to start. it is a bad sign that the battery charge is low. If it occurs regularly maybe its time to replace your battery or reconditioning. Learn more about it here.
Battery Warning Light
If the little light in the shape of a battery symbol shows up in the dashboard in your car while you are driving, it means the charging system is not right. It may be or is the battery is the cause of the problem, but it’s better to check it out.
This warning sign is helpful because it gives you a chance to fix the problem before it completely drains the battery of its stored energy. You don’t want to be caught stranded unexpectedly in the highway, do you?
Additionally, newer cars have a battery light, similar to the check engine light. This will only light up if there’s an issue with the battery.
How Old Is Your Car
Typically, the life expectancy for your car battery is about 6 years, depending on the weather, vehicle type and driving habits. The earlier lifespan of your car’s battery can be attributed to frequent short trips. It takes about eight hours of non-stop driving for the alternator to fully charge.
When your car is not frequently fully charge, the negative plates will be impacted with sulphation. Sulphation is the strong crystalline deposits which prevent the battery from charging properly. Its time for your battery to do some reconditioning. Learn more about it here.
Electrical Component Issues
Your car contains a vast numbers of relays, fuses and wires, and other important electrical components. If any of these parts are non-functioning, your car either will not function or it may results in bad driving conditions.
When you turn the car’s key and the car’s engine couldn’t turn over, what could be the problem? A dead battery obviously, and this the most common of electrical problem you may encounter. Sometime, you may continue to use the light and other accessories but not for long. You can resolve it by applying a quick jump-start, but honestly, how many times do you want to this if it occurs too frequently?
If you sent a car mechanic to diagnose your car and found out that your car battery will no longer hold a charge and it needs to be replaced. Are you going to spend sixty bucks for a new battery or do you want to learn how to do reconditioning of your dead battery? Learn more about it here.
Swollen Battery Case
If your car battery is found to bloated or swelling, do not remove by your self. Call a mechanic fast to look into it. Swelling occurs when the battery is overcharged and it may posed a danger to you and your car.
When the car battery bloats, heat and hydrogen gas is built up causing the other casing to warp and expand and may explode.
Smell Of Rotten Egg
Typically, battery are filled with a mixture of water and sulfuric acid. If your car battery leaks, the sulfuric acid will give out the rotten egg smell. If you would check the corrosion around the battery terminals, this is a common sign of a sulfuric acid leak.
The problem with battery that uses sulfuric acid, because when it evaporates it lead to the poor performance of the battery. Either you replaced it with a new one or learn to master reconditioning the battery yourself. Learn more about it here.
Multiple Jump starts Needed
A damaged car battery will most likely to start a fire when you tried to put the jumper cables on.
Sulfuric acid contained in the battery can be leaked out as vapours as results of the jump-starting.
These vapors are highly inflammable and the jumper cables might cause a spark, and ignite it, causing fires and even a explosion.
One too many jump-starting your battery can also damage your car other systems. You may buy a new one to replace the old one but you can learn in reconditioning it yourself to prolong its life and save some money. Learn more about it here.
If you are quick to respond to any of these critical signs, it is possible that you may extend the life of your car battery and also your car. If you own a car for the first time, you may not familiar with what is behind the engine hood. Your battery and the alternator together are the main source of electrical energy to the entire car. Even though the alternator play an important role in generating current on its own to the electrical system, it also helps in recharging the battery. The battery on its own cannot recharge itself and if it is not recharged constantly it soon die off.
Battery Reconditioning: How To Extend The Life Expectancy Of Your Car Battery
How long can your car battery last?
Good question. The answer is as long as it can hold a charge.
Once it cannot be recharged, it’s dead.
Let us assume your car lived in an ideal conditions – no excessive humidity, and no high temperatures. Everything is perfect, then your car battery’s life expectancy is about 6 years.
The lifespan of your car is attributed to the climate on where it resides, If you are living in colder climates with your car, there are chances your car batteries can last much longer than if you’re living in hotter areas.
On average your car battery lives from two to five years, why is this so?
Sulfation will occur to your battery in a warmer climate that can cause considerable damage to your car battery. That’s why it cannot last.
What can you do to extend your car battery’s life? How to maximize the lifespan of your car’s 12-volt battery. Read on.
Don’t Kill Your Car Battery Prematurely
Factory defect is seldom the cause of battery malfunction. Bad driving habits are the main cause.
Driving short distances with heavy uses of accessories powers prevent a full periodic full saturated charge is key towards the longevity of a lead-acid battery.
Lack of understanding of how car battery works and its maintenance can literally drive them to an early death.
What Is Lead Acid Battery?
A lead-acid battery in its simplest form is a storage device for electricity. The role of acid lead battery in your car is to supply power to the starter and ignition system to fire up the engine plus all the necessary power supply to the car’s electrical system.
If you’re familiar with a 12 Volt car battery, you’ll find a plastic case with six cells connected in a series each has 2 bolts each. Each cell consists of negative sponge lead plates and positive lead oxide plates.
The solution or electrolyte is made of a mixture of 35 % sulfuric acid and 65% distilled water. The chemical reaction between the lead plates and the solution inside produce Direct Current (DC) electricity.
A by-product of this electrochemical reaction is the production of lead sulfate which coat the plates. During recharging, the lead sulfate should convert back to active materials, in essence, returning the battery to its former state.
Once the battery starts to operate by completing the circuit, it starts to discharge materials from the plates who reacts from the electrolyte to generate electricity.
Due to its simplicity in build lead-acid batteries despite all the modern age batteries, are the most dependable and widely used rechargeable battery still used by many today.
If your battery is dying it doesn’t mean you cannot nurse them back to life. Have you heard of reconditioning your battery to bring a new lease of life back to them? Learn more about it here.
How To Prolong The Life Of Your Car’s Lead Acid Battery
Do a routine check on battery terminals
Often time, people are just plain lazy to look after their car’s battery until its too late.
Don’t throw away your car battery just yet. A useful tip will help you saved about 90 bucks for a new battery.
The corrosion which formed around the battery’s terminals have eaten into the wires and terminals.
What I learnt is that by adding a bit of baking soda in water will help in removing the crust around the terminals. Spray a bit of terminal protector after you have cleaned the terminals before the wires are placed back on the sockets. This will prevent corrosion from building up in the terminal for a while.
There you are, you have just restored your car battery to its former glory, unless, of course, you have neglected your battery for too long and it’s dying. After cleaning up the corrosion crust (make sure it didn’t get in your eyes because it is corrosive), you can try reconditioning your battery yourself. Learn more about it here.
Do not operate any car accessories if the car is not turn on
The main purpose of car battery is to start the engine ignition of the car rotation of the engine. It drives the alternator forcing electrical energy current into a battery where it’s stored as chemical energy. Car batteries supply lights both inside and outside the car, woofers, GPS navigation, DVDs, headlights.
The battery supplies the electrical energy for starting the car, then once the engine is running, the alternator takes over to supplies electricity to all electrical components of the vehicle. The alternator also charges the battery to replace the energy spent to start the engine. The voltage regulator prevents overcharging.
Remember the alternator is also charging the battery and running all the accessories in the car.
Most people don’t really realize that once the car is running your alternator is the main power source.
When your car is off and you’re still using the accessories, the battery once again takes over as the main power source. Depending on type of car and all the accessories you have in there, your alternator is going to use more than likely forty per cent to sixty per cent of its capability.
You are aware that when you have a heavily loaded amplifier and you do not have a larger alternator you are starving your amplifier from operating. Instead, it is tapping on the juices on the batteries to keep it going, while the alternator is keeping hard to recharging the battery. That will give an extra burden on the alternator and may overheat and causing damages to it.
So, if the car has not yet turned over, do not use the electrical accessories because it is relying on the battery to power those devices. It will detrimental to your car battery health in the long run.
What happens when a battery cable fails
When your car won’t turn over as it should, don’t rush into conclusion quickly and buy a new fuel pump straight away.
Take your time to find out what’s is wrong, it can be anything from low voltage, computer failure, to fuel injection failure or something else.
You should conduct a test for these items to find out the underlying cause. One such problem most people overlook is the condition of the battery cables. The cables may not clean that it should be. The cables may be deteriorating at the terminal head, and cables may be separating away from the nuts, thus causing a no connection. Also, the cables are breaking and weren’t getting sufficient ground and the insufficient ground is causing the car not able to start.
Insulate your car battery from extreme changes in temperature
There are two reasons died a premature death. They either die due to extreme heat or due to extreme cold.
You have to protect heat from your car battery and also to protect from other electronics in your car. The acid might leak from the battery and destroy what is in there. You should use a car reflective aluminium insulator to reflects away engine and engine exhaust heat keeping your battery cooler. The reverse is true, the reflective aluminium insulator will keep the battery insulated against the cold temperature outside while allowing proper ventilation.
Insulating your battery can help to maximize the battery’s lifespan from both the extreme changes in temperature.
How to recharge your car battery
The best thing to do to keep your battery fully charged, beside using a battery charger or a solar battery charger, is to drive your car on a regular basis, say three to four time in a week and not to keep it idle.
You should drive at least 10 km at a time, not just short trips to let your car’s alternator sufficient time to recharge your car battery. Having to feed your heater, rear defroster, and heated seats in winter depletes the alternator capacity to recharge the battery.
If you not to drive as often as it should, just idling your car can do more harm to your battery. If you are not driving for some time, it is best if you could pull out the negative cable from the battery to prevent to prevent the electrical system from drawing electricity even if the car is left idle. Accessories like alarm, clock , car computers, and GPS draw electricity in order to keep it operating.
You may accidentally keep the car’s front lights overnight and you’re sure busted the battery dead the next morning.
To prevent this mishap, always keep a portable battery charger handy in your car in case everything you’ve tried to revive your dead battery fails.
You’d learn an important tip here, but a dead battery no amount of effort can revive it if it has left unattended for too long. Learn how to reconditioning your dead battery yourself to save some money instead of going out to purchase a new one. Learn more about it here.
Check your car battery’s water level
Conventional batteries contain a liquid “electrolyte” which is a mixture of sulfuric acid and water. The plates in a lead battery contain an active material that should be continuously bathed in electrolytes while oxygen and hydrogen gas are released during charging.
While a battery should only be filled after it is completely charged, you should check the water level before charging. Before charging, make sure there is just enough water to cover any exposed plates. After charging, add enough water to bring the level to the bottom of the vent, about ¾ below the top of the cell.
It’s important to note that battery owners should never add sulfuric acid to their battery. During normal operation batteries will only consume water – and not sulfuric acid. When your battery’s electrolyte is observed to be low, filling the battery with water will keep the battery healthy and safe for use.
Most car batteries indicate if there is a need for water.
So check the car battery water level indicator regularly and if water is needed, refill the battery with distilled water (and that’s important, ONLY use distilled water to refill your car battery).
When do you overcharge your car battery
The alternator is a device in your car that coverts mechanical power generated by the engine into electrical power to charge the battery. When the alternator dies, it stops generating electricity for the battery.
If a wrong alternator is used in a car, or if the alternator is running at a wrong pace, it will create too much electricity for the battery, tendering it to be overcharge.
Faulty charger can also caused overcharging. The settings may be wired incorrectly or the charges may be labeled incorrectly. To avoid such problem, always monitor your battery when you doing your charging.
Extreme heat in the summer may have a adverse effect on your car battery. They tend to overheat and overcharge in the process.
What happens when you overcharge your car battery?
The battery simply die. An overcharged battery will boil the sulfuric acid water mix. The casing to the battery can be hot to the touch and beginning to melt and swell.
If that is not scary enough, the battery’s fuel cells begin to build up flammable hydrogen gas. This causes the casing to swell up and the gas starts to seep through the small fissures. This inflammable gas once it makes contact with oxygen, where a smallest electrical spark could ignite and cause an explosion, spewing out lead-laced shrapnel everywhere, including caustic sulfuric acid.
Check your car’s alternator
You may think that your car battery is the main source of electricity throughout the car entire electrical needs.
You are wrong and that’s not the case.
Your car battery will initially supply the electricity necessary to turn over your car. When the car is running, the alternator (akin to a dynamo) takes over to generate electricity to feed the electrical system and charge the battery.
The car’s alternator works in a similar way as a generator. So, when the car’s internal combustion engine spins, it spins the pulleys under the bonnet, which in turn pulls the pulleys on the alternator, to produce energy.
There are some preventive maintenance you can put in place to extend the lifespan of the alternator for years, even in cases of heavy use. If left unchecked for a long time, the damage caused by the heat, vibration and contamination can reduce its lifespan considerably.
Since heat is the main cause of alternator’s failure, the alternator’s cooling system need to be check periodically, to check of any blockage in its ventilation vent. If there is a external fan installed, make sure it is in good working condition.
Keeping your alternator in check will ensure you of trouble-free longer time on the road, and help to keep the battery charged all the time.
Safety Precautions you must remember:
How to disconnect a car battery terminals
If you want to work on your vehicle, and you have to disconnect your car battery, here is an important tip you must adhere to. This prevents you from electrocuted or possible acid being spew on to your face or body.
Get ready your gloves, goggles, battery socket wrench, and socket wrench extender. Loosen the negative battery nut first to reduce the risk of sparks which can make the car battery explode follow by the positive nut. Once the positive terminal is removed, do not let it get in contact with any metal parts of the car as there are some charges left in it. If it gets to touch the possibility the car’s electrical circuit may be disruptive.
You can easily locate the negative nut by the – negative sign, and the positive nut by the + positive sign. It’s very important to follow this sequence of removing the nuts. Once the negative cable is removed, it must not make contact with the positive cable.
Where to charge your car battery
Oxygen and hydrogen gas is emitted from your battery during charging. Make sure the room is well ventilated with a fume hood or an exhaust fan to prevent the build-up of these gases which may lead to explosion.
Conclusion
If your battery dies, is there a solution?
Can you bring it back to life again? Yes you can, by reconditioning it.
If you have 12 V car battery, reconditioning means nursing back a battery to health with a full charge and standard electrolyte level. The process is neither too complicated nor highly technical. to learn.
Battery reconditioning can save you money instead of buying a new one.
You can learn how battery reconditioning here.
“How come everything I need always comes with batteries?
Disclaimer: The information contained in this article is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be construed as advice on any subject matter. You should not act or refrain from acting on the basis of any content included in this article without seeking professional advice. Reliance on any information provided by this article and others appearing on the article is solely at your own risk. The article and its contents are provided on an “as is” basis.
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