dankhts

Odd thing, when I started my vette ('02 C5) this morning to go to the gym, a code flashed by the D.I.C. said "CHARGING SYSTEM FAULT" I barely noticed it, but the car fired right up, and the volts were up on the gauge as well as the read out......
Ran fine, charging ok, I checked everything visually - wires/batt/alt/belts - whatever I could see, but all appears well.....
A few days ago, wifey was out in it booting around, and called me from the mall to tell me it wouldn't start, but then tired it again and everything was ok... I checked it out then as well, put the gauges on the alt to check output etc, load tested the battery etc....no problems... so I just patted her on her blonde head.....but now I see there may be something up with it after all....
I do suspect the battery may have a bad cell - it's about 2 1/2 years old and went dead once or twice from sitting around....
Any thoughts/suggestions?

CanadaGrant

I have noticed the same thing on my 02 Z. It has happened half a dozen times since new but usually only after I have had a trickle charger on the battery. It shows up right after start and only lasts for about five seconds. I changed out the original battery last fall. It was still fine but was getting pretty old (5 yrs) so I installed a yellow Optima and I still had the same message once since then but never had an actual problem.
Were you charging it prior to the message?
Grant

dankhts

No, it wasn't on the charger - it had been driven every day pretty much for the last 2 weeks, so I don't think that's it......
The read out shows between 13.9 - 14.2 volts..... and the alternator checked out ok on the test machine here at our shop.....

Airwilf

Dan, My original battery crapped out on my 02 in 05.No warning.Started it up,drove to Tim's for a coffee.Tried to restart & nothing-zilch.Tried to jump start it from the wife's car & it wouldn't even take that.I was worried then.Towed to Wills Chev ,put a new battery in & been good since.I didn't have any DIC messages & the gauge & DIC readings were normal until that last start.I guess it killed it in one final start attempt.I usually hook up the battery Tender if it sits for more than a couple of days also

Miaugi

When I had my C5 I also saw that message a couple of times....seems to be (for the most part) a C5 Gremlin. That being said if you are having starting issues a new battery might be a good idea, but you may want to have the entire charging system load tested as well.

CanadaGrant

I also think it is just one of those C5 gremlins. I get the same display every once in a while and it is nice to get a warning but it seems that when something really does go wrong you never see any warning whatsoever!