my battery, what?

[fast97gt]

well by george i figred it out. its been in the mid to upper 90s here the last few weeks here in NC, well the car has been running a bit warmer then usual, let me tell ya a bit warmer like on the L of normal for our guages.

well i checked and double checked everything, the ccrm is functioning correctly, i have high and low speed settings on the fan. low speed pulls about 8.5-9volts, the high pulls 13.2-14volts. the high speed was throwing me because with nothing else running (a/c, lights, etc.) it would only pull that voltage. with everything going it would only pull 11.7-12volts.

well it was wrong, its supposed to pull the low to high 13 volt range. with the fan running on less voltage it doesnt turn the correct rpm thus not pulling the needed cfm. so i says well i then tested the alternator with the my volt meter and it put out 13.89-14.13volts depending if the a/c was on or along with the headlights.

with that checking good, i then turned to the battery. from experiance the battery depending on group size should put ou aroun 12.5-13volts with the engine not running. well mine was putting out low 11s. it seemed like it would get harder and harder to start in the AM. the battery only beeing 7yrs old i took it down and bought a new one.

this new battery has 60 more cca. installed it and wam bam the fan pulled the correct amount of voltage, as did everything work like it should. the altenator tested good as well (home test with volt meter).

now my only fear is the starter going out because of the incorrect amperage from the old battery for so long (guessing 6-8mths). i thought i had a malor cooling problem, but turns out its the simple things that make it easy, but sometimes its gotta smack us before we figure it out.

 

[Dark04GT]

another story indicating that basic preventative maintenance is the best mod. Happy the battery fixed things up for you. I remember putting in my new battery made startups and everything much better.

 

[fast97gt]

**UPDATE** i went for a drive today, and decided i would get on it a lil bit. use too with the a/c on the car would lug. today the problem no longer exists. 1st-2nd pulled like it did before the battery swap w/o the a/c. i was like holy crap, so i turned off the a/c and nailed it. 1st spun and 2nd barked like hell. i thought i wasted my time doin the pi engine swap cause i virtually couldnt tell a difference by the sotp meter. but now i can guys this is what i dreamed of, yea 55hp at the flywheel may not be much. but when i did the engine swap i was really disapointed. i swapped the battery saturday and man. the battery i swapped out was 7yrs old. it makes a difference when these new cars rely so much on the proper power and amperage from the battery, the alternator only does so much.

 

[Pearl02]

**UPDATE** i went for a drive today, and decided i would get on it a lil bit. use too with the a/c on the car would lug. today the problem no longer exists. 1st-2nd pulled like it did before the battery swap w/o the a/c. i was like holy crap, so i turned off the a/c and nailed it. 1st spun and 2nd barked like hell. i thought i wasted my time doin the pi engine swap cause i virtually couldnt tell a difference by the sotp meter. but now i can guys this is what i dreamed of, yea 55hp at the flywheel may not be much. but when i did the engine swap i was really disapointed. i swapped the battery saturday and man. the battery i swapped out was 7yrs old. it makes a difference when these new cars rely so much on the proper power and amperage from the battery, the alternator only does so much.

I had a similiar situation. You need a good battery even in some older cars. I have a 78 El Camino that needed some tnder loving care. I got things figured out with it after a while. I started to notice that the power level seem to be dropping. I checked everything out again and I couldn't figure out what was going on with it. I drove it this way for some time. One day I just happen to look at the battery. It had a large bulge on the side of it. I took the battery in and had it checked out. It was putting out 11 volts. I also decided to replace the negative battery cable because I had already replaced the positive one. What a difference does changes made. I know exactly what your talking about. Glad you got that figured out. Pearl02.