Swens651

I purchased a new red top from interstate last july, so exactly 1 year ago. over the winter i let the battery sit in my basement w/o touching it. Now, it decides to go completely dead after a day of driving it. and it usually does so when im not home (big pain in the ***). And when I mean dead, I mean its so dead you can't jump it back to life, honk the horn, or get 1 single thing out of it... its completely gone. i took it to interstate and they tested the battery and alternator and said both are just fine, so they won't let me return/exchange it. i had a shop next door charge it for 8 hours getting it up to 100% and it still did the same thing after a few months of driving it. Now, I can put the battery in my car and sit in my garage and turn the key so the electronics only come on and i do this back and forth about 5 times and slowly the voltage drops each time.

was the problem me not charging it over the winter? is it shot ?

fastassls1maro

iTrader: (22)

the new optima batteries arent what they used to be. I have had my red top in my car for going on 8 years now and i just trickle charge/maintain it in the winter while im not driving it. I guess a while back optima got bought out buy a company and since then the quality has gone down hill. i would take it back to interstate when its stone dead and have them test it, its possible one or more of the cells is shot.

Swens651

Thanks for the reply - I plan on taking it in this week and having interstate do a full charge on it (they said to fully cycle through the charge it has to charge for 16hrs.). If they do a full charge and it goes dead again then i know for sure its a bunk battery.

McGinnis

Check you voltage, If it's under 11 volts hook it up with jumpers to another battery in parallel and put a charger on the good battery. After and hour or so check the battery. If it's at 12 volts by now put a charger on the battery that was dead all by itself and see if she charges up now, if not it's time to get a new one. Optima Red's are a 36 month free replacement warranty usually.

imma_stocker

iTrader: (19)

This is the last optima battery for me. It must stay on the trickle charger or it completely dies over the weekend. Pisses me off because it costs so much and none of my chargers bring it back up. Best method so far is taking it to parts store after work then picking it up the next morning after charging all night.

MuhThugga

Unfortunately, the Optima Red Top quality has gone to absolute **** over the years. I think it was around 2010-2011 when people started to really have issues with them, which was right around the time they started popping up in the big chain parts stores.

I have a Die Hard Platinum battery now. I would highly recommend that battery.

Swens651

So, Interstate is absolutely sure it's not the battery and can't replace it for me since they say the stats on the battery are off the charts. They say it holds the voltage and has 1200 cca when only rated at 720. So, they are trying to tell me the battery is perfect and it must be something else with the car.

Swens651

dude, i do the exact same thing and im still scared to shut the car down anywhere, because I feel like it won't start. Really sucks to have to constantly be worried about that if you need to turn your vehicle off....so, I don't anymore. I just take the risk of leaving it on when i get out of the vehicle and just make sure to do it only when i can see the vehicle from the store i am in and only when im in a store/place for a very short amount of time.