praetor

I can't speak for cars but I trickle charge the batteries on my motorcycle. My batteries lasted 7+ years. I only rode a few months out of the year as it's cold in Chicago and they sat in an unheated garage all winter.

buckets

iTrader: (1)

might be a little off topic, but has anyone have any issues with their clocks? mine is always 24hrs behind and i got so tired of correcting it, i wanted to get a new battery when i took my '13 in for an oil change hoping that'll fix the issue but the tech told me the battery was still ok...

GregCanada

I see what you did there...

2GR

All good info. I will get a load check this week.
Had a friend who's OE battery developed a nasty blue mushroom on the positive terminal within a week...real messy cleanup. (2012 Camry)

DavidMosby

Get the largest battery that will fit and be sure it is AGM. Walmart has the best warranty for 5 years but limited availability. Advance Auto has 25% off and you can use it for the AGM batteries. Read up on them and you will never get plain lead acid again. Get a Ctek charger and charge it once a month. This will desulfate the battery. The battery might outlast you.

Nalod

I had a 1989 420SEL with battery about double the size of normal. Looked like a marine battery! I was not aware that batteries can arc (explode) upon starting. This was car was 7 years old, maybe had 60k miles on it at the time. Lucky no electronics were damaged.
Now I replace every 5 years. The occurrence freaked me out.

swfla

iTrader: (1)

Who created this chart? I lived in FL for 30 years and found that extreme heat is a killer.

swfla

iTrader: (1)

According to Scotty Kilmer on Youtube, Optima has changed their production methods and are no longer producing great batteries. Too bad.

bclexus

Correct, heat is a killer of batteries...as the map indicates that heat is.

swfla

iTrader: (1)

I read a bit (I'm no expert) about AGM batteries as you suggested and it appears that they have a different charge rate than lead acid. It can be a real issue for battery chargers that don't have an AGM setting. more importantly, several mentions of car computers indicating issues/codes/check engine lights because of this different draw. Considering how computer centric all cars systems are these days, I'm not surprised. I'm not saying it would be a problem with all cars, but it'd be $$$ out the window if it were. AGM does sound great overall otherwise.