Help, quickly
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 262
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
Help, quickly
My car has been sitting for the last two months with no battery tender. I went out to start it today and the battery is low... to low to start it. So I shut the key off and got out to get out the battery charger BUT the security light is flashing and it is pinging like the door is ajar, lights on or something. I can't get it to shut off after checking everything to make sure it is off. Taking the key out does no good. So what do I do.... it is sitting out here pinging.
HELP
HELP
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disconnect the battery... hook the battery charger back up and wait till the battery is charged
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 262
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
The only reason I have not done that is I fear the radio won't work because of the security and I don't know the code. Am I creating another problem unhooking the battery with it pinging, and me with no radio code.
Thanks for the quick help.
Thanks for the quick help.
Team Owner
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The pinging should stop with a charged battery. Most likely the radio will be fine. I have swapped batteries plenty of times and no issues.
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 262
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
I sure appreciate the help. I just went out to unhook the battery and see the ping has stopped. So can I charge the batter with it in the car and NOT unhook the cables or is it necessary to unhook the battery cables.
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Team Owner
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you can charge it in the car but it would probably be better to just disconnect it, charge it and reconnect.
Team Owner
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my next question is how old is the battery? If it is that discharged it may not fully recover and you will end up doing this again. The one thing I have found is my C5 hates to be left unattended for much longer than a week. If I would go 14 days I am sure the battery would be dead. I hear people say they go months but that has never been my experience in 12 years
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 262
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
The battery is only a couple of years old but I guess it could be bad. I will have it checked as soon as I am back on the road. You can bet I won't let it set this long again unless on a tender. Live and learn. This is my first winter with the car so it had not gone through any sitting around up until now. Thank you again.
I am off to charge it up.
I am off to charge it up.
Drifting
Joined: Oct 2003
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From: San Antonio TX
just charge it the c5 gets really cranky when the battery is low, I was sure that my PCM was fried at one point untill i charged the battery. the pcms get confused when the voltage is below a certian level and unlike real computers they do not have watchdog resets built in to take them offline under these conditions.
good luck
By the way you should be fine just charging it with the cables attached that is what I do.
good luck
By the way you should be fine just charging it with the cables attached that is what I do.
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 262
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
I charged it with my 10 amp charger for a little over an hour. The car fired right up. I let it run for about 20 minutes in the shop. I did not take it out as it is raining. Tomorrow I will drive it,assuming it starts. I did not see any codes etc. so hope I am good to go and everything works as it should.
Thanks everyone for the advice.
Thanks everyone for the advice.
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I charged it with my 10 amp charger for a little over an hour. The car fired right up. I let it run for about 20 minutes in the shop. I did not take it out as it is raining. Tomorrow I will drive it,assuming it starts. I did not see any codes etc. so hope I am good to go and everything works as it should.
Thanks everyone for the advice.
Thanks everyone for the advice.
awesome..I was just checking back to see how it went.
I don't know how true it is but I once heard you need to drive a car at highway speeds for an hour to charge the battery.
Anyway I hope this resolves all the issues.
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jul 2010
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From: Jefferson City Missouri
The next morning it fired right up. I drove it for a couple of hours so all is well with it now. There were no codes or other adverse effects from the dead battery nor my recharging of it. I have learned my lessen in that I am ordering a battery tender to put on it so this does not happen again.
I also have always heard that I needed to drive the car at highway speeds to actually charge the battery. I think that in my case my charger had pretty well brought it back to nearly normal condition. I am not sure it is accurate or means much but the amp gauge shows a little over 14 amp at the idle or highway speeds. This MAY mean that the battery is being recharged at about the same rate both at the idle or highway speed.
Pewter99, thanks for the assistance, I really appreciated it when I was not sure what to do.
I also have always heard that I needed to drive the car at highway speeds to actually charge the battery. I think that in my case my charger had pretty well brought it back to nearly normal condition. I am not sure it is accurate or means much but the amp gauge shows a little over 14 amp at the idle or highway speeds. This MAY mean that the battery is being recharged at about the same rate both at the idle or highway speed.
Pewter99, thanks for the assistance, I really appreciated it when I was not sure what to do.
Race Director
Joined: Apr 2007
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From: South Western Ontario
It's not an amp guage, it's a voltage guage and a little over 14V is the correct voltage if all is well.
You can charge the battery with the charger just as well as you can when driving.
Grab a Ctek charger/tender if you're going to keep leaving it sitting.
Peter
You can charge the battery with the charger just as well as you can when driving.
Grab a Ctek charger/tender if you're going to keep leaving it sitting.
Peter