Hello all..
I had a question about the battery! How do you know if your battery is dying? are there any signs or observations we have to do to check the battery?
Because I am not sure when the battery was replaced in my car!! I drive a
1993 Nissan Altima.Praveen
Many auto stores will check your battery free. Around this are Kragen's or Pep Boys but I'm sure that Checkers, etc. do it also.
The old tried and trie process used a large load resistor and a measure of the open circuit (no load) voltage at the terminals and the voltage with the load on it. From that it's easy to get an idea of the internal resistance of the battery.
High internal resistance is an indication of a batter nearing the end of its life.
These days they'll do it with a small hand held box with a digital readout.
It's worthwhile to replace a battery before you get stranded somewhere and can't start the car. Cold weather is particularly bad because battery capacity drops dramatically as the temperature goes down. A battery that worked fine in warm weather can leave you unable to start the car when there's a sudden freeze.
Praveen wrote:
Somewhere on the battery there should be a label that says something like "recharge if not installed by nnn xxxx", where nnn is a month and xxxx a year. The battery will be about 4 months older than that date. That's the shelf life of the charge in a dry charged battery, after that it can't just be filled, allowed to stand 2-3 hours and used. It has to be fully charged. It will extend the life of a new dry charged by about 6 months if it is given longer to stand and then charged as well - takes about a working day to properly put a new battery into service. Turn up at a battery merchant and demand a new battery NOW and it will last about one day past the warranty as reducing the standing time below 2 hours will seriously reduce the battery's life.
If you can't find a recharge date it could be the original battery. My dad and I had 3 OEM Nissan 910 Bluebird batteries (Hitachi) last over 10 years each. We sold one car with an 11 year old battery! Started first turn of the key every day of it's life - except the day I burnt the coil out by having the ignition on and engine off for 3 hours. The other was smashed up at 15 years old and the near 5 year old battery went on to give over 5 years service in a Celica.
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