Car Batteries - How often do your replace them?

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emmo

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#268075 26-Feb-2020 19:42

From your experiences how often have you replaced your car battery? Reason I ask is because about a decade ago I never recalled replacing my car battery as often as I do now. In 12/2013, I replaced the original jap import car battery with a new one from AA. That battery lasted until 01/2017 or just a month after the 3 yr warranty. Then today 26/02/2020, second battery goes dead, and abruptly if I may say. Again just over a month past the 3 yr warranty! Both batteries are from AA. Makes me wonder if there is some kind of defect with AA batteries as mine simply died right after passing the 3 yr mark.

By the way, my car is a Tiida which I drive from home to work daily (Greenhithe to Takapuna) and around Auckland on the average around 200km weekly. Not a lot of long night time heavy use of Air Conditioning driving.

Interested to know your experiences? Do your car batteries also last only 3 years? Most of my friends say they've not yet replaced theirs for the last 5 or more years.

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#2427714 26-Feb-2020 19:50

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6 years is about what I seem to get, but people I know who are always leaving the door open and running it flat have them fail within warranty.

Richard rich.ms

AKLWestie

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#2427717 26-Feb-2020 19:57

My parents used an AA branded car battery long time ago and it lasted just over two years (back then it was a two year warranty).

My preference is Exide or Century batteries. My last two Century batteries on two different cars lasted six or seven years. I replaced it not because they were dead, but I think it is about time to replace them. I don't want to get stranded on the roadside if I leave them for too long.

Linux

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#2427718 26-Feb-2020 19:57

6 years is really good

AKLWestie

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#2427720 26-Feb-2020 19:59

Linux: 6 years is really good

Yes, it does depends on how often I use my cars. I make sure both cars do at least one long return trip (>= 30 kms) per week to keep it well charged.

djtOtago

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#2427729 26-Feb-2020 20:30

My 2013 i30 diesel bought new, is still on its original battery.

My other diesel, I replaced its battery 6 years after I bought the vehicle. It looked like the original supplied battery, so that would have made it about 7 years old.

My Mazda petrol had its first battery replaced after 4 years. The next was 5 years.

alasta

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#2427730 26-Feb-2020 20:42

I wonder how much of a difference it makes if you have an idle stop-go system. I imagine that is quite taxing on a battery.

richms

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#2427737 26-Feb-2020 21:02

alasta:

I wonder how much of a difference it makes if you have an idle stop-go system. I imagine that is quite taxing on a battery.

They keep everything running when cranking and will throw a check engine code when the voltage drops too much when cranking, and need an absurdly high CCA battery designed for it that costs as much as an old dunger with it is worth sometimes.

Richard rich.ms

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#2427768 26-Feb-2020 22:18

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4 or 5 years feels about average.

Goosey

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#2427772 26-Feb-2020 22:23

Op. Your commute distance is relatively short.
“A long drive at speed”, say to the twin tunnels and back would be the ideal thing to do a couple times of year. This will allow ya alternator to give the battery a good charge.

cold cranking amps; the higher the better if you are doing a lot of parking up and still listening and charging devices.

Side note. A lot of mechanical workshops can slow trickle re-charge batteries for you.

SATTV

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#2427775 26-Feb-2020 23:05

I would have thought Greenhithe to Takapuna would have been enough to charge the battery from starting.

My father is a ( now retired ) auto electrician and he used to say you would get about three years out of a battery, but technology has changed since then.

I have a jap import Tiida also, I do approx 15 - 16km each way to and from work plus running around, if I have a few clients to see I can do 100km in a day. I have not had to replace the battery but for the past couple of years it will struggle to start in Autumn for a few days then seems to recover. My car is outside and not garaged.

My father also used to let customers know that charging a flat battery was like filling a bucket with a high pressure hose, you can only fill the bucket up so much on high pressure so you need to drop the pressure to fill.

So as someone else eluded to, you might have to do a good run once a month to keep the battery tip top shape.

As for brands, I dont know, Dad used to sell Excide batteries, the AA dont make their batteries they are rebadged ones from ???

I would look at upgrading to a slightly larger battery to see if that helps.

Antidotally a friend of mine with a Lexus has told me Toyota / Lexus get lots of battery issues as parents often will use the car / suv to do the school run and that is not enough to fill the battery up.

Good luck, love my Tiida.

John

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K8Toledo

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#2427817 26-Feb-2020 23:35

emmo:

From your experiences how often have you replaced your car battery? Reason I ask is because about a decade ago I never recalled replacing my car battery as often as I do now. In 12/2013, I replaced the original jap import car battery with a new one from AA. That battery lasted until 01/2017 or just a month after the 3 yr warranty. Then today 26/02/2020, second battery goes dead, and abruptly if I may say. Again just over a month past the 3 yr warranty! Both batteries are from AA. Makes me wonder if there is some kind of defect with AA batteries as mine simply died right after passing the 3 yr mark.

By the way, my car is a Tiida which I drive from home to work daily (Greenhithe to Takapuna) and around Auckland on the average around 200km weekly. Not a lot of long night time heavy use of Air Conditioning driving.

Interested to know your experiences? Do your car batteries also last only 3 years? Most of my friends say they've not yet replaced theirs for the last 5 or more years.

Well coincidentally I just replaced the battery in my BMW today. I believe the old battery - a 950CCA behemoth is the original factory installed in 2003.

I'm curious if longevity of life scales with cranking power?

Jase2985

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#2427827 27-Feb-2020 04:03

alasta:

I wonder how much of a difference it makes if you have an idle stop-go system. I imagine that is quite taxing on a battery.

they use different batteries that have been designed for that sort of thing

I would say 3-5 years is normal. maybe your tiida has a subpar charging system on it which is leading to it failing around the same time each time?

Bung

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#2427830 27-Feb-2020 05:20

On our previous car each battery lasted 5 years. The 1st replacement was because the car was intermittently failing the air bag test after starting. The current in the airbag circuit gets measured to check connections and low voltage screws this up. Eventually a faulty connector was eliminated so that battery could have lasted longer.j The 2nd was because 5 mins with lights on while parked flattened it even though it had just done 100km.

The Australian Challenge battery FAQ makes the claim that some modern cars still have quite high standby currents unless locked. Old cars wouldn't have had any standby current unless there was a clock.

emmo

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#2427861 27-Feb-2020 07:54

From the responses so far, batteries should last longer than 3 years. Come to think of it now I think AA might have given me an old battery when I had it replaced in 2017. Because when I had it checked by AA first then an independent shop next both initially said the battery is very old basing on the battery code. From memory, the code starts with "M". But I knew it was bought and installed in Jan 2017 because I keep a log book of all repairs done on the car. Anyone knows what the battery code should have been for the year 2016/2017? Just thinking that if indeed AA provided me a much older battery back in 2017 then I might have grounds to file a complaint.

SATTV

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#2427910 27-Feb-2020 08:16

There used to be two codes.

A = Jan
B = Feb
C = Mar
D = Apr
E = May
F = Jun
G = Jul
H = aug
I = Sept
J = oct
l = Nov
M = Dec

B = Jan
E = Feb
S = Mar
T = Apr
I = May
N = Jun
O = Jul
U = aug
R = Sept
D = oct
A = Nov
Y = Dec

This would notmally be followed by a number and that would indicate the year of manufacture.

i.e. M6 = Manufactured in Dec 2016

John

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