car battery, how close of a match to OEM required ?

Get a battery with the largest CCA rating available that will fit into the space. If your car is fairly old, batteries have improved, and you can get a higher capacity battery than the OEM one. This means the battery will last longer, effectively.

Do not ever get a lower CCA rating. Batteries get old, and they degrade, and you want one that can degrade as much as possible while still starting your car. An oversized battery is a win.

If you have more capacity than you need, the battery can degrade more and still be okay, under any conditions.

If you are in a place where it gets very hot, or a place where it gets very cold, you might investigate special batteries designed for those conditions also.

Sheesh, if the car is under warranty, get the dealer to replace the battery on HIS dime.

--scott

All that makes much difference is that you get one that physically fits the space and has the same or better CCA rating. My experience with "bigger/stronger" batteries is that they don't last any longer then "normal" capacity ones. I buy whatever has the best combination of warranty/price. I don't think the warranty on the car will be affected by your choice of replacement battery, it would be a real stretch for the dealer to make any connection.

The most important thing is to get a fresh one. Batteries don't like to sit on a shelf.

thank you for all replies.

the reference to warranty was due to a local dealer performing a recall/warranty service (toyota) and upon finding a non-OEM battery they claimed to owner that entire warranty has been voided.

according to their words ".... the higher capacity/CCA battery has caused (components) to be fried... "

there are no issues with the car, nothing is broken

the owner is simply having car checked according to the letter where dealer adjusts as needed the acceleration related components.

"eddie" wrote in news:hn84dv$jq1$ snipped-for-privacy@news.eternal-september.org:

Complete and total nonsense.

Just because the battery has higher capacity doesn't mean it will actually be /delivering/ that capacity. If the systems in the car never request that capacity, the battery won't deliver it.

It's common in my neck of the woods to fit batteries that are more powerful than OEM in order to ensure good starting in winter.

You're being fed a line by the dealer. The dealer cannot void a factory warranty; only the automaker can do that.

The dealer is NOT the automaker, but is a completely separate company with idependent ownership and control.

You need to call the Toyota head office in your country and speak to their customer service reps.

When you drink some water, you only drink as much water as you want.If you left the water faucet open it would be pouring out water all day long. A device which is using amps from a battery only uses as many amps as it needs. You can lead a horse to water, if the horse doesn't feel like drinking any water, you can't make the horse drink. cuhulin

It is indeed nonsense, but it's the kind of nonsense that dealers will use to get out of doing the repairs that they're legally supposed to do. Don't buy from people that do that kind of crap.

--scott

(components)

er adjusts as

Balls, balls, bullshit and balls. First of all, any automotive lead- acid battery operates at a nominal 12V (or 6V if you have a car built before the mid-50's.) *overvoltage* can cause components to "fry" but the battery physically can't cause that unless you installed a battery with more cells than the original (the odds of that having happened being, um, none.) The car's electrical system in operation is at a higher voltage than the battery can provide whenever the engine is running, because on a 12V system the battery typically puts out something like 12.5V but the alternator will put out close to 14V. If there is an overcurrent condition at those voltages then something else is bad and the battery didn't cause that either. Your dealer is trying to poke you in the no-no spot and you should complain to the regional service manager and tell them exactly that.

Oh, and never go back to that dealer again. Write a letter to the owner of the dealership, tell him the name of the service adviser that fed you that line of horseshit, and tell him that that is exactly why you will never go back there again, and that you're telling all your friends and family this story. After you complain to the regional manager, of course. Hopefully that'll get the a-hole fired, but unfortunately, I don't hold out much hope for that.

nate

Very clever that Toyota - they use the battery itself to regulate/limit current flow. They're probably the only ones in the industry that does this. I guess that's what makes them special. :-)

For some reason, I put the biggest battery that would fit in my old Scirocco. It worked great except closing the hood and shorting the top terminals and starting a fire was a possibility. My guess is that shoehorning a big battery into cars is the cause of a lot of engine fires. Nowdays, I stick with the recommend battery dimensions.