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Type 25 Battery and Tyre problems

Hello chaps and chapesses,

A couple of questions which you experienced owners might be able to help me with.

  1. When my van hasn't had any use for over a month it is quite common that there isn't enough juice in the battery to turn the starter long enough for the engine to engage. The three times this has happened using a car to jump it hasn't been enough and each time the AA has had to come out with an industrial sort of charging unit that has enough power.

To stop wasting my time and AA call-out allowance I'm going to buy one of these units - does anyone else have experience of using these or owning one? I'm basically looking to see where I can get one and what sort of features I should look for.

  1. The rear offside tyre is really misshapen. The wall of the tyre is really badly worn on one side but fine on the other. I also noticed that the front right tyre has a lower pressure mark on the side. Should all 4 tyres be inflated to the same rating, and is this what has made the rear tyre screwed up? I'm replacing the bad tyre soon and was wondering if it would be a good idea to sort out the other tyre with it.

Many thanks in advance for any help you can offer,

Caie

Reply to
Caie
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Is the van parked anywhere near a Mains outlet such that you could employ a small battery charger? After being fully charged (during a highway run), the battery should be kept at roughly 13.5V while idle. This is called a "float charge" where no actual charging is going on but just enough voltage is present to counteract the tendency to discharge.

Caution: Don't use a "trickle charger" as these can over-charge the battery over a long time.

(It's also possible that there is some load from an accessory discharging it or that the battery is reaching end of life.)

Loads more battery info here:

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Speedy Jim
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Reply to
Speedy Jim

Nope - it's in a garage down near the airport without access to mains of any kind :( I don't think there is anything connected to the starter that discharges it, I have a leisure battery that powers everything else seperately. It is probably an old battery. Once I can get it turned over I'll shoot to the nearest autoshop and get something bigger with a larger CCA for the winter months.

Reply to
Caie

Hi!

Did you consider that you may need a new battery? I got a battery at O'reily's. It lasted only 2years and 2 months.

The battery I have now is from Autozone. I got it in May 2002. It still seems to be ok.

I got a Portable Jump Starter at Wal-mart. It looks like a yellow box with battery cables hooked on it. They had two different kits. I got the more expensive heavy duty kit. I can get an inverter for it to convert from 12 volts to 110 volts.

I have not needed it yet.

It has to be recharged about once a month.

I wish I had got the Prestone brand from Advance Auto though.

Next I am thinking of getting the Schumacher SE112S Battery Charger:

1.5 Amp Fully Automatic Onboard Maintainer/Charger at Advance Auto. It costs about $29.95 US dollars. J.C. Whitney carries them but cost about $10.00 US more.

Keeps 12 volt batteries charged. Fully automatic. Turns on and off as needed. Allows safe charging of RV, deep-cycle or most batteries that may have a long storage period. "On Board" feature allows mounting of charger next to battery on collectibles, street rods and other infrequently used vehicles. Hardware and mounting brackets are included.

1.5 amp trickle charge rate-charges in 2 to 12 hours LED lights-Indicated Power On and Charged. Reverse-polarity protection. Molded plastic case

I planned to permanently mount this one and just plug if in when I am not going to be driving for a few days.

Reply to
Sleepy Joe

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