How to treat a totally dead battery
I just got my '67 L71 home after an almost two month odyssey of non-delivery and foul-ups from a major car transporter (the worst I have every had in 7 years doing this) with a totally dead, discharged Restoration Delco battery. I was able to jump start the car and drive it 2 miles home. But, nothing electrical seems to work with the almost dead battery, like headlights which stall the engine, etc. I am charging it overnight to see how it functions tomorrow, but I am worried the battery is toast. Are there any test/checks I can do to judge the ability of the battery to charge and hold a charge. Thanks, it is about 4 years old and has never been even low before.
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Big Tanks In the High Mountains of New Mexico -
Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
Is this one of those restoration batteries that have the odyssey battery inside?
If so, I resurrected my battery with a CTEK charger. I had to restart it about a dozen times to go thru it's de-sulphide program before it actually started accepting a charge.Steve L
73 coupe since new
Capital Corvette Club
Ottawa, Canada -
Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
I also resurrected mine with a new Schumacher charger that I have. I never thought it was possible and I was ready to give up, but it did the job and it has continued to hold charge ever since.
BTW, my battery came with explicit instructions NOT to jump start it.
Stu FoxComment
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Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
If your battery is a AGM battery it does take a special charger to charge it up. Google " Charging a AGM battery " there is a good article by Hod Rod magaizine that talks in detail about bring back a dead AGM battery using a conventional battery charger.
MikeComment
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Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
Mike, A dead battery always like a slow charge at a low amperage. If you have a volt meter just monitor the battery, a full charged battery is 12.66, sometimes with the wall mount chargers that put 1 to 3 amps don't quite get the battery to the 12.66.New England chapter member, 63 Convert. 327/340- Chapter/Regional/national Top Flight, 72 coupe- chapter and regional Top Flight.Comment
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Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
Thanks all. This morning the battery is still not charged and seems to not be accepting a charge. I suspect it is the Restoration battery with the Odyssey battery inside, as the instructions say to only use the Odyssey charger, which I have and have always used on it. Now I am wondering what the car transport company did to mess the battery up. It left fully charged and no problems and arrived 7 weeks later totally dead and not accepting a charge. I am hoping they didn't cross the cables when they tried to charge it. If they did, even when I put a new battery in it there may be more damage. I will never use Horseless Carriage for transport again.Big Tanks In the High Mountains of New MexicoComment
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Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
Call Tom at RB as he can answer all your questions about the battery.Comment
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Re: How to treat a totally dead battery
I will say this, when a battery is so dead that it won't even take a charge, in other words no reading and seems to be a open circuit, you can get it to start charging by a reverse charge for a minute. It will have a small spark when hooked up in the proper direction and start charging. The reverse charging allows it to complete it's circuit forward.
The odds of getting the battery back to it's peak are slim in most cases because of the damage it suffered on the plates while dead.
DomComment
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Big Tanks In the High Mountains of New MexicoComment
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