click click click click click - battery dying?

iskyfly · Post by **iskyfly** » Sun Aug 01, 2010 10:53 pm

05 sxt auto

Went to start the car this morning and it did the ratatatatatatatat thing. Checked light switches and nothing appeared to have been left on. Time on clock was still current. Jump started and went about the day. In thinking about this I remembered that during the past week that starts were slow / laboured.

I cleaned the posts and contacts. I Put a charger on it and the needle on the charger went from 10 amps (charging) to 0 amps (green light indicating charged) in about an hour and then entered trickle charge. Started the car ok, but still seemed sluggish. The next morning it barely turned over. I unplugged the battery connections and put the charger on it again. It took 3 hours for it to go from 10 amps to 8 and never progressed any further after 2 more hours. The engine did crank like new though. I took it to advanced and the guy put some sort of meter on it, he inputed the cca value and ran some sort of test. He said the battery checked out fine. I then explained that I have had to charge it the last couple of days, so he asked me to start it up. He ran another test on it with the car on and said the battery is completely charged and appears fine.

So how do I reconcile the fact that the charger cant get it to the charged state regardless of time and the "its fine" from the tests the store guy did?

I purchased the car used, the batter says daimler chrysler on it 05033271; 80; 450 cca; 26R-48.

lilnicko11 · Post by **lilnicko11** » Sun Aug 01, 2010 11:50 pm

starter? alternator?

Post by **racer12306** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 7:34 am

If the battery is 5 years old it's probably junk.

iskyfly · Post by **iskyfly** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 9:17 am

lilnicko11 wrote:starter? alternator?

im hoping thats what the guy tested when he tested the battery with and without the engine running.

last night the battery was at 12.7 and this morning is now down to 10.5.

cgneon · Post by **cgneon** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 9:35 am

bad battery.,... if its at 10.5 its junk

iskyfly · Post by **iskyfly** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 10:43 am

thanks all. battery replaced.

cgneon · Post by **cgneon** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 1:03 pm

glad it was a simple fix..

TheFrette87 · Post by **TheFrette87** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 1:11 pm

Makes me wonder what's going loco in my SXT. I drove it fine home from work yesterday, got out and locked it, no problem. I started working on my R/T, about an hour or so later i had a friend get something out of the car, and it was still fine, i even remember hearing the horn when he hit the lock button... Not even thirty minutes later we went to grab a bite, and my car did the ratatatat. I noticed there was no dome light, no radio, no ANYTHING. After less than a minute, these things magically came back on. Radio read 12:00. Tried turning it over again, ratatatatatat. and everything went dark again, and reset. So I threw jumper cables on the battery and let it soak for a min, tried to turn it over, STILL happened. Just when i was about to give up, i gave it one last try and VROOOM! I let it run until we made our run and got home, but it fired up fine after i shut it down, and has since. I just bought my battery less than a year ago, and i don't have any subs or extra lighting...Ideas? or should I not worry?

Edit: After the dome and radio came back to life (The first time), i took a voltmeter to the battery to check voltage, it was ~12.53.

lilschmied · Post by **lilschmied** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 4:27 pm

TheFrette87 wrote:Makes me wonder what's going loco in my SXT. I drove it fine home from work yesterday, got out and locked it, no problem. I started working on my R/T, about an hour or so later i had a friend get something out of the car, and it was still fine, i even remember hearing the horn when he hit the lock button... Not even thirty minutes later we went to grab a bite, and my car did the ratatatat. I noticed there was no dome light, no radio, no ANYTHING. After less than a minute, these things magically came back on. Radio read 12:00. Tried turning it over again, ratatatatatat. and everything went dark again, and reset. So I threw jumper cables on the battery and let it soak for a min, tried to turn it over, STILL happened. Just when i was about to give up, i gave it one last try and VROOOM! I let it run until we made our run and got home, but it fired up fine after i shut it down, and has since. I just bought my battery less than a year ago, and i don't have any subs or extra lighting...Ideas? or should I not worry?

Edit: After the dome and radio came back to life (The first time), i took a voltmeter to the battery to check voltage, it was ~12.53.

check your posts and make sure the cables are tight

TheFrette87 · Post by **TheFrette87** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 5:15 pm

lilschmied wrote:check your posts and make sure the cables are tight

Posts are clean, no visible corrosion, and tight enough that i cant wiggle them at all. I may go have the battery tested today JIC i was sold an old one.

Post by **occasional demons** » Mon Aug 02, 2010 6:49 pm

Couldn't hurt to remove them and clean them anyways. Also check the terminal in the PDC.