Battery dead again! Check Engine Warning!

[joshtaylor87]

Well I was about to go out tonight, but the car wouldn't start! The battery was dead again! It's about the 7 or 8th time its been dead since I bought it back in October last year.

Here's a bit of history:
Have had it looked at by the dealer as a lot of the earlier VE's were having the same problem so thought mine may have it too, but they said they tested what ever they test for that problem the VE's were having and its fine on mine. They said that current was constantly being drawn from the battery when the car is off and said it will most probably be the audio system i have in it. So thought yeah sure your just saying that so you don't have to find the problem. But I did notice that when ever i opened the boot I could hear a fan noise coming from the amp.

I rung the audio place that installed my audio system and told them and they said oh yea we've had a couple of those amps with a problem where the internal fan doesn't turn off and it slowly drains the car battery. So I thought well thats just awesome! I paid $2000 for this amp as it was supposed to be the best, hand made in California etc etc. But now the thing is killing my battery. So they say yeah we will fix it under warranty but have to get the parts in from USA will be about a week or two. So I thought great at least it will be fixed and I no longer have to worry about my car being dead the next time I use it.

But its been 5 weeks now and those parts haven't arrived from USA yet. So now my battery is dead again tonight after not driving it all week. So I jump start it off our VE SV6 like I have all the other times. And now I've got a Check Engine warning! That won't go away. When I first bought the car the dealer said if i ever get a check engine warning, not to drive the car and get it to the dealer some how for them to check it out.

So should I be driving it tonight or the rest of the weekend? Or should I not drive it and get it looked at by the dealer on Monday?

Hope I haven't stuffed anything by jump starting it! But have done it many times before without this problem?

Any suggestions?

(sorry for such a long post )

[andyman]

disconnect the battery for 5 minutes and reconnect, if the warning comes back on get it to the dealer


it may have been something as simple as a sensor sending a low voltage which brought up the fault

[joshtaylor87]

Ok, I'll go and try that now.

[joshtaylor87]

That seems to have worked. Thanks for that andyman.

Once I get the amp fixed, would you recommend I get a new battery? Seeing as though the factory battery in mine has been flat 7-8 times? Would it not be holding as much charge as it used to? Or would it be ok?

[andyman]

That seems to have worked. Thanks for that andyman.

Once I get the amp fixed, would you recommend I get a new battery? Seeing as though the factory battery in mine has been flat 7-8 times? Would it not be holding as much charge as it used to? Or would it be ok?

good to hear, being a calcium battery they need a lot of amps to charge them properly, it can take a day if it needs it, id see if you can find access to a calcium battery charger and try that before replacing it, calcium chargers output a much higher amount of amperage to get the battery to take the full amount of charge,

if you do replace the battery make sure it has the same rc and cca cant be higher or lower or you will be faced with the same problems as the battery specs is registered in the ecu to regulate the charging system

[VH commodore]

also disconnect the amp till you get it fixed so it wont go flat again. or disconnect it every night so it will start in the morn.

[joshtaylor87]

id see if you can find access to a calcium battery charger and try that before replacing it, calcium chargers output a much higher amount of amperage to get the battery to take the full amount of charge,

if you do replace the battery make sure it has the same rc and cca cant be higher or lower or you will be faced with the same problems as the battery specs is registered in the ecu to regulate the charging system

OK thanks for the advise andyman, you're a champ!

also disconnect the amp till you get it fixed so it wont go flat again. or disconnect it every night so it will start in the morn.

Yeah that seems like the smart thing to do! But I don't want to have no stereo while I wait for the parts. And can't be bothered to disconnect the amp every night. So its my own fault that the battery keeps dying.

The thing is though I have noticed that in the last couple of weeks I can no longer hear the fan going when I open the boot. Nor can I hear it when the stereo is on so this to me looks like the fan has burnt out or something from running 24/7 for for 9 months. So I wouldn't have thought it would be draining any power now that the fan is no longer working? Or would it still be draining the power even know the fan isn't going?

[Supe]

OK thanks for the advise andyman, you're a champ!



Yeah that seems like the smart thing to do! But I don't want to have no stereo while I wait for the parts. And can't be bothered to disconnect the amp every night. So its my own fault that the battery keeps dying.

The thing is though I have noticed that in the last couple of weeks I can no longer hear the fan going when I open the boot. Nor can I hear it when the stereo is on so this to me looks like the fan has burnt out or something from running 24/7 for for 9 months. So I wouldn't have thought it would be draining any power now that the fan is no longer working? Or would it still be draining the power even know the fan isn't going?

It would use power for sure if the fan has ceased up, it's still applying the same power to the little motor in the fan but the fan won't spin due to the bearings maybe having gone "square".. Touch the centre of the fan and see if you get any warmth off it.

[joshtaylor87]

Ah ok supe, I can't touch the fan as it is inside the amp but what your saying sounds right to me. I wouldn't think a small little fan could draw enough power to drain the battery. I suppose the fan constantly drawing a small amount of power would all add up over a couple of days without driving it. This is when I have the troubles, when I haven't driven/started it for a few days. Usually 3-4 days.

[Kevhaze]

but antill u charge that battery up with a proper charger it will go flat again

[Holdfast]

Airstrike Plus

[vicarious]

Mate could you let us know a brand of charger for the calcium batteries in the VE.

It seems that the normal lead acid chargers that we are use to, do not provide the correct charging performance as you have pointed out in your post above. And to tell you the truth, I'm a bit confused about what battery charger to use.

I'm due to purchase a new battery for my boat and was thinking of buying a maintenance free calcium battery with the same characteristics as the battery in the VE so I had a backup.

The charger I have (lead acid) applies a high current and then trickle feeds

So mate, if you have time could you recommend a charger and or explain (a bit more)why a lead acid battery charger is not suitable for charging calcium bats

Cheers

the old style chargers wont charge the calcium batteries to 100%, it think they go around the 70% mark.

Projecta

[Holdfast]

Airstrike Plus

[whitey66]

These are the type that we use at work,as recommended by Holden.

http://www.redarc.com.au/Winter-06-Newsletter-lr.pdf

[uniq souljah]

my battery kept dying on me also i didnt know why, but after it happened i also got that check engine sign about the 5th time. i took it to holden coz it finally ****ed me off and they said that some sensor was ****ing up or something like that and they had to reset the BCU(or something along those lines but it was a computer thing) after they done that its been working fine and no problems since. maybe you have the something similar wrong with your ve?

[andyman]

Mate could you let us know a brand of charger for the calcium batteries in the VE.

It seems that the normal lead acid chargers that we are use to, do not provide the correct charging performance as you have pointed out in your post above. And to tell you the truth, I'm a bit confused about what battery charger to use.

I'm due to purchase a new battery for my boat and was thinking of buying a maintenance free calcium battery with the same characteristics as the battery in the VE so I had a backup.

The charger I have (lead acid) applies a high current and then trickle feeds



So mate, if you have time could you recommend a charger and or explain (a bit more)why a lead acid battery charger is not suitable for charging calcium bats

Cheers

the charger we use a work is a c-tek fully automatic one, it comes at cost tho, around 500 bucks although ours is a more 'industry' use and overkill for domestic use.


ours it multiXS 25000
http://www.ashdown-ingram.com.au/CA2571B7001714EB/page/Products-Ctek+Battery+Chargers?OpenDocument&1=03-Products~&2=01-Ctek+Battery+Chargers~&3=~




as written in that website for people that didnt read it, the charger we have takes 3minutes to charge a standard vt commodore to the point of starting

[CSP]

REDARC supply power conversion products to the global trucking and automotive markets

The SBC1205 is $268.95 including GST and freight (to Canberra).

Its a 12v Calcium Baterry charger with charge and maintain (trickle) feature.

Works fine on the VE...

[Holdfast]

Airstrike Plus

[joshtaylor87]

Got the amp fixed today. I dropped it off in the morning to have them take it out pull it apart and solder a resistor or two into the cooling fan circuit, which fixes the problem of it not turning off. Picked it up at 5pm to be told that they were unexpectedly buys today so they didn't have time to pull it apart and muck around with it so they just installed a brand new amp with the fan problem already fixed from factory.

So I'm very happy with the outcome. I wasn't too keen on them pulling apart a $2000 amp and playing around with the electronics. So very happy that they gave me a brand new one. My old one had a few marks on it from being bumped by loose objects in the boot, so now I have a new one with no marks or anything.

[andyman]

Got the amp fixed today. I dropped it off in the morning to have them take it out pull it apart and solder a resistor or two into the cooling fan circuit, which fixes the problem of it not turning off. Picked it up at 5pm to be told that they were unexpectedly buys today so they didn't have time to pull it apart and muck around with it so they just installed a brand new amp with the fan problem already fixed from factory.

So I'm very happy with the outcome. I wasn't too keen on them pulling apart a $2000 amp and playing around with the electronics. So very happy that they gave me a brand new one. My old one had a few marks on it from being bumped by loose objects in the boot, so now I have a new one with no marks or anything.

excellent just get the battery charge up properly and it should be all good,

p.s if you dont properly charge a calcium battery and it keeps going flat you will wreck it pretty quickly and you wont have much change from around 150 - 200 bucks

[joshtaylor87]

No worries andyman will do. It's done 14,300kms so I will get them to charge the battery up when I put it in for its 15000km service in a couple of weeks.

Cheers

[CSP]

No worries andyman will do. It's done 14,300kms so I will get them to charge the battery up when I put it in for its 15000km service in a couple of weeks.

Cheers

they'll need it overnight to charge it fully.

[andyman]

they'll need it overnight to charge it fully.

thats depending on the charger the workshop uses tho.

[CSP]

thats depending on the charger the workshop uses tho.

If it's a proper calcium battery charger (which all Holden Service Departments should have) then they will need it overnight. That's what a guy I know who works in Holden Service told me anyhow...

[andyman]

yes ours is a proper calcium charger, and as i said it depends on the charger, our can take up to 6 hours for a pretty darn flat battery (reds barely visible) so 6 hours is well within our working day