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Charging a dead battery or jump starting


nixy

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My car has been in the garage for three weeks after having a winter detail and wax. I've been driving my Clio while its been wet and dirty outside! This is the longest I've not driven it for and the first time ever the battery is dead! Call me paranoid but is it ok just to jump start it? I've heard all sorts of dodgy tales about imobilisers etc! I was thinking about buying a trickle charger - any advice? Do I need to disconnect the battery to use one of those?

Happy Xmas by the way everyone!

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One of these

http://www.amazon.co...1&keywords=ctek

 

One of these two, depending on sizes (I don't know 350z terminal sizes, GTR is 8mm)

http://www.amazon.co...=ctek indicator

 

http://www.amazon.co...=ctek indicator

 

And one of these if you need a longer cable

http://www.amazon.co...=ctek extension

 

Disconnect negative terminal first, then positive. Attach comfort level indicators then reattach positive then negative. Should see one of the LEDs on the comfort indicator flash on and off to tell you the state of the battery.

 

Plug CTEK into wall, not on, connect to comfort indicator, switch on at wall. Done :)

 

I have my car plugged into the CTEK whenever I know I'm not going to be driving it for more than a couple of days, keeps the battery in decent condition as sometimes I can go a couple of weeks without driving it.

Edited by TomS
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Jump starting is easy; Connect up the leads negative to negative then positive to positive (with both cars switched off). Then start the engine of the good car and leave it running for a few minutes (gently revving it occasionally). Then try to start the car with the flat battery ~ if it doesn't start then leave it awhile and try to start it again say 5 minutes later.

Once the car with the flat battery has now started disconnect the negative from it and the other negative from the good car. Then disconnect the positive from the good car and the positive from the car that had the flat battery. Then you will need to ideally go for a long drive ~ maybe 20-30 minutes to get sufficient charge back in the battery.

 

If the car with the flat battery fails to start doing this then I'd say the battery is dead and you will need a new battery. Hope that helps. :thumbs:

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  • 3 years later...

Sorry for dredging up a very old topic.

However my Zed goes in for its service and MOT on Friday having been put away for the winter.

I've been starting the car every month and driving it up and down my driveway (Which is as much as I can do legally)

 

The battery has died twice during 6 months, last time I trickle chargered it but this time I'm just going to jump start it.

Some people are saying:

 

Positive to Positive

Negative to Negative

 

Others are saying

 

Positive to Positive

Negative to Ground.

 

 

Can anyone let me know which is correct?

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Ideally you would connect the Negative terminal of the good battery to chassis ground, that is any metal part of the chassis.

 

The reason for this is 2 fold; 1) it is slightly easier to actually jump start the car from an electrical perspective but mainly from a theoretical point of view.

 

2) when connecting up there may well be a spark, it would be sensible to have this spark as far away from the battery as possible owing to the way the hydrogen reacts.

 

Personally whenever jump starting a car I have always connected to the battery terminals and never had a problem. As the dead cells are not charged then the sparking becomes less of an issue. This issue really comes into play when you have fully charged a battery and are connecting it up. You should leave it as long as possible (usually 12hrs) between disconnecting the battery from its charging source and connecting back into the car. If you charge the battery in situ then you dont have the sparking problem.

 

Basically, in an ideal world connect to chassis ground. In the real world, you shouldnt ever see an issue with connecting directly to battery.

 

Hope that helps.

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