charge battery in situ

alan_d

Batteries are damaged by being discharged too far.
It sounds like your weekend incident did that, hence the problems now.
A 40-minute drive should be plenty to charge it, I don't think there will be any change from trickle-charging.
Only fix is a new battery.

Ganga

You can also check the tension on the fan belt,if not tight may be slipping on the alternator.

sevenhills

David_Aston wrote: »

Although the handbook for our Honda Jazz does say that it is recommended to disconnect the wires, I have been connecting up a trickle charger with all wires connected, for a couple of years or so, and no probs, up to now.

I have done this recently too, all ok.

System

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

Be careful you dont blow any electronics; not all 12v chargers are the same. Some have smoothed output and some have noisy output with voltage spikes that have th epotential to damage electronics.

It is a good job then that the battery is a huge capacitor which will smooth them out.

System

The damage is done now even a 20 minute drive would sort the battery out you need a new one an expensive mistake look on eurocarparts or carparts4less and see which is the cheapest and get someone to fit it for you

sevenhills

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

Be careful you dont blow any electronics; not all 12v chargers are the same. Some have smoothed output and some have noisy output with voltage spikes that have th epotential to damage electronics.

Just the same as an alternator then?

jeradon

I've always left everything hooked up when using a trickle charger, and no serious problems so far.

Ant555

l966dpy wrote: »

The damage is done now even a 20 minute drive would sort the battery out you need a new one an expensive mistake

Thanks for all the replies.
For info - in case anyone searches on this in the future I disconnected both leads just to be safe and charged for 4 hours - seems better but time will tell.
Standard stereo in the Corsa D didnt need a code and remembered my stations which I was surprised at.

Yes it could be an expensive mistake and I only realised when I did, because I happened to be looking for the car key and found them in the ignition!

Steve_KK

If you have access to a multimeter, even a basic one you can perform some tests. There will usually be a 20V DC voltage scale that these can be set to. If you are on the voltage scale it will not harm anything if you connect the probes the wrong way round - you'll just show a negative reading, which would be the same only positive if you swap the probes over.
Before you try starting the car and with the ignition off check the voltage of the battery - it should ideally be about 13V but anything above 12.5 should be OK.
Next with the engine running check the voltage again. If the alternator is charging the battery properly the voltage should be over 14V, although anything above 13.2V should be OK, if not ideal. If it's below 13.2V then there is a problem with the charging, which is most likely the alternator, but could be faulty wiring.
Just a word of warning on cheap car batteries - if you plan to keep the car for more than 2 years a cheap battery might be false economy. I've had a Lion battery go faulty on a car I bought, and I knew the previous owns, so can be sure it was only about 2 years old. My father has also had the same brand of battery fail after about 18 months. On the other hand I have a Varta battery on a 2002 car that appears to be factory fitted (looking at date stamps embossed in the plastic) that is still working. You can get deals on quality branded batteries which would make them better value and less hassle than replacing a cheap battery every 2 years.

Regards,
Steve

System

13.2V is too low and the alternator is knackered if it is only putting that out.