[s-cars] kids these days with their fancy computers and battery chargers

[JC]

Gents: 
 
I posted on QW that the hatch to Ye Olde Battlewagen had been left cracked
open with dome light on for a 4 week trip abroad, resulting in the exact
battery situation that you can imagine as well as the usual reset routines
required for central locks, auto-windows, remotes, not to mention radio
stations etc. Interesting outcome of the hassle though... 
 
The Avants battery was a Delphi from CPO (crazy previous owner) that must
have been at least 5+ years old.  I was sure that poor battery was toast but
thought I'd give it a whack on the old charge box just in case. Well my
battery charger is a crusty old boatanchor that my Dad got for free from one
of his woodchuck buddies that owed him money in 1975 or something like
that... basically a banged up metal box with a transformer inside, an
ammeter on the front, and a coupla wires.  I always figured "what the hell,
amps is amps" and it'd served its purpose more or less when needed, but it's
been repaired more times than it deserves, and I'd noted an intermittent
connection on the plug a few times... After having a challenge getting it to
charge at all this time I had the wake-the-F-up-you-moron moment and
realized duh just go get a friggin new charger and be sure it's the battery
and not the charger.  My only half decent immediate-gratification option was
Sears so off I went and snagged their 'Platinum' superduper smart
microprocessor brain blah blah charger on sale for $87 or something... after
wrestling with a stuck rear door lock, hooked the cables up and let her rip.

 
Short story long - thing took almost all day but seems to have rocked that
battery back to life like Frankenstein coming off the slab.  I swear it's
got more juice now than when I am just driving the car around on normal
daily recharge mode. 
 
After that, I thinks "hey whaddabout that old deep cycle Marine battery from
the boat lying around in the pile of hazmat recycling". Neither the
boatanchor or another trickle-charge-battery-maintainer had been able to get
that thing to charge anymore and I'd long given up on it.  It's been sitting
flat dead on the basement floor for 2 YEARS now. Well Emeril says BAM, the
Brainiac charger somehow revives that piece of lead waste and it's holding a
nice 13+ volts. Unbelievable. Of course I'm not going to count on those
batteries having a huge life and come cold weather I won't be surprised if I
need a new one eventually but Im impressed they can even temporarily be
brought back to life. 
 
Naturally I didn't RTFM before hooking the thing up because I'm a man and
I'm handy and who needs the fuqin manual, we don't need no steenkin manual,
but now I have a look and I guess these CPU brained modern units not only
auto adjust current supply for max battery based on construction type
(reg/deep-cycle/gel) but can even whack the batttery with a little zap for
desulfation action if it thinks its necessary.   These kids with their crazy
"science".  What will they think of next? I hear you can even get the
internet on computers now. 
 
Probably old news to the smaht crew but thought I'd mention it to anybody
retahded like me who's been cruising along on some old charger and hasn't
been able to get a battery to revive once or twice...Hmmm maybe there's
something to upgrading your tools every 30-40 years or so.  I'm now
wondering how many batteries I replaced because the crap boatanchor charger
couldn't revive them.  I can think of at least 2 or 3 I suspect mighta come
back to life. 
 
JC
 
 
---- current ----
1995.5 S6 Avant 
2003 E46 M3 Cic
2008 A3 2.0tDSG
---- past lives ----
2006 A4 2.0TQA
1998 A6Q 2.8 PES G2
1989 200TQA SJM
1990 CQ
1997 A4 1.8TQ Wett
1987 4kCSQ 
 
John J. Cunningham
 <mailto:jc at j2c3.com> jc at j2c3.com
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