question Which new batteries?

The batteries on the Explorer finally curled up and died the other day after 12 years. They were big old fashioned 12Volt lorry batteries with TYPE 333 on the side and had a cold crank capacity of 630 amps each. I'm using a couple of land rover batteries temporarily which aren't up to the job without a boost to turn the engine. Question is do I look to replace with the same or are there better things on the market now? I don't want to spend ridiculous money on something like gel type batteries, even though the ones used on land rovers etc have a higher cold crank capacity than my old lorry ones. any suggestions please? Thanks.

I would go to an agricultural dealer and look for something along the lines of 663. 663 and 664 are the same type but with the poles the other way round, so one of each makes a neater instalation.

Cheers Croc. I thought I would replace with similar as they lasted well. Didn't know about the different posts on 663/4 so I'll look into that. Have a good christmas mate. Daz

For info, most battery sizes have a mirror image ie same size battery but + and - poles in opposite positions.

Can also be on same side on the top or diagonal and a combination of + and - in different places.

Thanks mate. Went into the local tractor place today and the 663/4 work out about £50 each. They do a 900 cold crank battery for £60 ish and a MONSTER Caterpillar battery which claims 900 cold crank but has been tested at more like 1200 amps. They can keep this at £100 each though!

Went into the local tractor place today and the 663/4 work out about £50 each. They do a 900 cold crank battery for £60 ish and a MONSTER Caterpillar battery which claims 900 cold crank but has been tested at more like 1200 amps. They can keep this at £100 each though!

All those batteries sound like a bargain if good quality.

Comparing a car / van engine to what ever lump is in your explorer that may well not get started for a while so need some churning to get fuel in the right places I would spend the extra on the larger 900A cold crank batteries.

Off topic but I have just replaced my car battery. The last one was Ducellier branded 4 year warranty and now only 3 months over that :-(

The car is 1.9TDi but a big battery size 110 (720A cold crank and 70AH capacity). My last car was 1.8TD but had a much smaller / cheaper battery - size 065 I recall which had ample starting power.

Halfrauds price for a 110 is now £119 with 3 year warranty and best I could find within 30 mile round trip to collect was £75.

I found Alpha Batteries in Rochdale and that their prices are better on eBay. OK the battery is not branded but I paid £54 delivered and it has a 4 year warranty.

The battery was sent yesterday, delivered early afternoon today and now fitted - not a 10 minute job as the battery is at the back of the engine bay and plastic covers have to be removed for replacement.

I found Alpha Batteries in Rochdale and that their prices are better on eBay. OK the battery is not branded but I paid £54 delivered and it has a 4 year warranty.

The battery was sent yesterday, delivered early afternoon today and now fitted - not a 10 minute job as the battery is at the back of the engine bay and plastic covers have to be removed for replacement.

I'm lucky in that Alpha batteries is only ten minutes away. Must have had half a dozen batteries off them in the last few years at good prices.

Hi Daz.

The ones from the Tractor place sound like a very good price. I paid £115

for the one in our Van to run 240v inverter for all the lights and 240 sockets.

Clive

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protruckservices.com

hi all, most agricultural dealers stock smaller car and quad bike batterys as well and they are all 2 to 3 yr warranty, most dealers will also stock CTEK battery chargers, i have just brought a multi XS 7000 and just reconditioned 3 batterys that would not hold a charge so it has paid for itself already, the batterys are all over 4yrs old and are now starting on cold mornings like new

regards

Thanks for all the replies. I have heard good things about the CTek chargers Graham. My problem was the battery casings had cracked due to age (12 years) and the terminals were very worn. It's a case of the best you can afford I suppose and my budget won't stretch to the CAT ones. I looked in Halfords the other day and couldn't believe the price of the batteries there. (No good for my use anyways).Not competitive at all in my opinion. Happy new year. Daz

This place are reasonable. I'm still tracking a 6 volt.

http://www.alpha-batteries.co.uk/

Any opinion on new batteries for an MJ? Ours keep flopping in the cold and won't hold a charge. They get so flat when you try and turn it over even the brake buzzer cuts out!

It's -3 here, just out to jumpstart the bloody thing again...

Stone

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_4855050_recondition-car-battery-home.html?cr=1

Tried this on a old battery, did get a few more months of life out of it.Daft as it sounds, try wrapping the batteries in newspaper.Have ben having the same trouble, fortunatley planned ahead and have a spare jump battery charged up ready.

fortunatley planned ahead and have a spare jump battery charged up ready.

Same here, it's still a pain though! Got enough charge into the batteries that it'd start unassisted earlier but it'll probably need doing again next week.

Spent a couple of hours this morning with my boss sorting an oil leak, looks like the rubber seal on the oil filter housing has frozen and shrunk If it's not one thing it's something else...hopefully it'll warm up before long!

Stone

Don't hold breath mate. Maplin's have their sale on 400 amp crank jump pack £24.99. bought one yesterday, used it today! :-(

Our local factor has sold out of batterys over the last couple of weeks.

Thanks for the advice. I think the extra £10 a piece for the 900 cold crank batteries is worth it. The old 630 CC ones did the job, but I think it's a useful extra bit of power to have.

Cheers. Daz

Our local factor has sold out of batterys over the last couple of weeks.

My boss was in Halfords earlier buying an extra set of jump leads, he said the three people in the queue in front of him were all buying new batteries!

Don't forget the extra CCA will also turn the engine over faster so it'll save you wear on your starter. They're usually a pain to replace so you don't want to be doing it too often

Stone

Rather they keep the starter spinning for longer.

Rather they keep the starter spinning for longer.

Yep, sorry, evening brain! The starter has a set number of amps it'll draw while held at stall, if your CCA is below this then won't be spinning as fast as it can be because the battery voltage will sag first under the load. More CCA allows you to get closer to the maximum until you exceed it; once CCA exceeds the required cranking current it lets you spin the starter for longer so giving the engine more chance to catch.

Stone

I assumed the motor stalled to give the worst-case current. I also never said CCA affects capacity in amp-hours.

CCA measures how many amps can be delivered for a given time at a given temperature without the battery voltage dropping below a given point. How much power is needed to be output from the motor depends on engine size etc, it has a rated current and rated voltage. If your battery's able to supply the required current for longer without the voltage dropping (higher CCA) I don't see how it's in any way a surprise that you're able to crank the motor for longer. Are you being deliberately obtuse or have I misunderstood you?

Stone

Ah, ok, I get you now.

How I see it:

Say you need to deliver a set amount of work to get the crankshaft turning (which will vary on how big the engine is, how viscous the oil is, clearances etc etc) and so you need to deliver a set amount of power to the starter to get things going depending on its efficiency. Power delivered as DC is by V=I*R and P=I*V. When you turn the key you get at least the CCA-rating amps flowing, at a steadily decreasing voltage depending on the battery capacity, so the power delivered to the motor is also decreasing. A higher CCA just means it can deliver that current (I'm assuming into a purely resistive load) for at least 30 seconds at 0F - or phrased differently that it will take longer for it to discharge until the starter stops delivering enough power to spin the motor because the friction's too powerful for it to overcome.

What I'm saying is that since you've got an approximately static load on the starter and you're delivering less and less power to the starter the longer you crank for, if the motor hasn't quite caught then you can crank for longer in a single burst with a higher-CCA battery than with a lower one, because you're delivering enough power to overcome friction for longer.

Does that make sense?

Stone

What makes a hell of a lot of sense, and cures a multitude of problems are the following tips:

Electricity is lazy! Give it a nice tight clean set of battery contacts, a nice thick multi core cable to run down, a short as is feasiable, electricity dosen't like digging it runs along the surface of a conductor. Then make sure all the connections to the starter are clean and tight, so the poor little elctrons don't have to heave themselves over a gap, or struggle through dirt. Thirdly and VERY important give them a good Earth to return to the battery.

Simpless. squeck! :n00b:

1) You never want to be able to stall the starter motor - melt-down of motor could well follow!!

2) It is not how LONG you can turn an engine over for - it is how FAST you can turn it.

Turn a diesel engine quick enough you can get away with batteries of much less Ah capacity -

'cos it tends to start much quicker!!

When I found a source of new affordable past sell-by date top brand batteries I went over to stonking great big things (larger than necessary for the engine) with mega-ampere-hour rating.

Then, when we had to start removing batteries daily from vehicles (and the big batteries finally sulphated up through lack of regular use and poor maintenance :embarrassed: ), I splashed out on small spiral cell type Optima Red Top and Yellow Top batteries (cost of batteries vs. a few sessions with osteopath - no brainer).

I discovered that whilst they may have a much lower ampere-hour rating, the juice seems to flow a lot quicker - hence the engine turns over faster and so starts if not instantly then a lot quicker. This is much more noticeable with big diesels.

One example for 24v systems - 2 x car-sized Optima 12v, batteries (each 50Ah, 815CCA) might well start more large engines (10, 12, 14 litre plus) one after the other than a pair of conventional construction 622 batteries (each 130Ah, 890CCA) or even larger batteries (say 170Ah, 1000CCA).

How do they do this? They don't spend anywhere near so long cranking each engine over :banana:

So I'm not sure increased flow of juice can be explained by CCA - more to do with the cell construction? :confused: Have a look at the OPTIMA website and see if you can work it out.

But - if you can start it on 2 x s/h conventional batteries what's the problem? I would always size up batteries for an engine by seeing what is fitted to a commercial vehicle with the same engine, as these are generally sized to give plenty of reserve.

I may well go back to conventional types where continuous removal is not necessary, simply on cost grounds.

Buy the best you can justify - and be happy with your choice