Thread: Flat battery due to radio when car is locked?

Originally Posted by Graeme

I wouldn't head off on an outback trip with a 4 year old starting battery even though I've had them last a lot longer with normal use.

Hi Graeme, this is a case of choice verses actual need.

As posted, you can have a new battery fail not long after acquiring it, and there have been plenty of cases with the D3s, reported both here and in the UK, where batteries have had a very premature failures.

I can remember a few back where there was a run on Optima batteries failing only a month or so after people bought them and going back a few more years, Odyssey batteries also suffered a similar situation.

Someone going bush BY THEMSELVES, should carry at least two batteries, irrespective of what type or age the batteries are, but in most cases, RVers travel in groups and this in itself is a sufficient safeguard.



BTW, while a cell failure is the obvious demise of a battery, many batteries, as they get near the end of their life span, just simply no longer hold a charge for any period of time and this seems to be where there is a problem testing batteries.

Particularly with Calcium/Calcium batteries, if a battery is going flat over night, but once the vehicle is jump started, the battery has no trouble starting the vehicle all day long, testing does not always show the battery as being faulty.

I have lost count of the number of times in the last 12 months where I have had customers ring me after they have had a flat battery a couple of times, had the local auto elec test it and say it’s fine and that the culprit is the dual battery isolator and that it needs to be fixed.

Not once has the isolator been the problem, every single case, the cranking battery was simply on it’s last legs but this didn’t show up in a load test.

If your car is 3-4 years old and an automatic, it is pretty foolish not to spend $200 on a new starting battery if you are going away to remote places.
ANY recovery is going to cost more than $200!!!

I even had my starter motor dismantled and inspected before my GRR trip last year (RRC 160KK) , but then I am a bit anal, but I don't usually break down either. Autos need a good starter motor and battery.
Regards Philip A

At the risk of hijacking my original post

Anyone ever see or more correctly hear, the audio system coming on when the key is remove and the vehicle locked?