I went to some of the seminars at Funfest a couple years ago. One of them had to do with some common problems like the column lock and the battery draining when parked. The guy giving the instruction said to make sure that it has a 120 minute (or more) reserve capacity. He said that most of the problems are because people have the wrong batteries with less reserve capacity.

While I think his recommendation is good, my factory service manual for my '99 shows the battery specification to only be 90 minute reserve capacity.

When I looked for a battery I found that many batteries/stores do not even list reserve capacity. I did find ones with 120 or 90 that cost about the same, so I would go for a 120 or more.

 

Same here. I've had a red top on my second year and not a single problem, but I replaced it this year for a fresher model. But like others have said, if my Corvette is going to sit un-driven for more than ten days I put the float charger on it. The draw back is if the Optima is if it drops below 11.5 volts it needs to have a vampire charge done to it.

 

Sears Platinum battery seems to be a great battery. If you can spend the cost for a quality battery go for it.

 

what be dat vampire charge?

 

Below is a link to a video from Carlisle by Paul Koerner, a recognized C5 expert. The discussion concerned column lock issues, but a lot of the focus was on the importance of battery reserve. To complicate matters, I think GM changed their part numbers, but the bottom line (of the presentation) was to NOT use the published Delco battery replacement (that all Corvette dealers will recommend) but to instead buy the higher-reserve AC Delco Professional Silver, part # 78PS. I would assume that any battery with the same specs would work. (700 CCA, 120 RC)

http://vettetube.com/view_video.php?...a#.UYw3sb4o7cc

 

As to Optima batteries, what I read on this forum years ago was that Optima was the only way to go because of leakage issues with conventional batteries. Red tops seemed to be the favorites, but there is a Yellow top as well. As guys started to figure out why the deep cycle Red tops didn't recover well from a complete discharge, they also found out that the Yellow tops recovered much more readily from complete discharges. The Vampire recharge mentioned here is that you connect your charger to a regular battery and then that in parallel to your Red top. Once your Red top tests at 11.5 volts or more, you can then connect the charger directly to the Red top. Many guys said that they were able to make their Red top recover completely in this manner. Supposedly, the Yellow top didn't need this type of procedure and was much more readily recharged from a complete discharge without consequences.

I don't know from personal experience, but I know that I would hate to find damage to my ECM from battery acid leakage and was very happy to see that my second '99, bought last spring, already had a Yellow top in it when purchased. Have had no issues, but have not been able to find an in-service date tag on it so I must be vigilant!!!!

You tend to like what you have good luck with. Basically comes down to personal preference after cranking amps and reserve minute ratings.

The professional and platinum conventional batteries seem to be what is popular now. Who is right?!?!?!? Not a clue!!

DSTURBD

 

Hmmm...I think I bought my Redtop on a Tuesday. No problems for 3 years now.