Battery Questions
 

Ok, so I go to start my 96 lumina yesterday, and it's a no go. Radio and interior lights/fans will come on, but nothing happens when I turn the key. Thinking the battery might be low, I try to jump it. It takes a while, but I finaly manage to do so.

Drive it around for a few miles to try and charge it back up, come back, turn it off, wait a few minutes, try again, and it won't start.

Try jumping it again, and that's a no go this time. The curious thing is that the radio/lights/fans still work.

So I get it towed to my mechanic, and don't hear anything back from them. So I call today a bit before closing only to find out that the car has been finished for some time. grrrrrrrrrrrr!

The person I spoke with on the phone wasn't very knowledgeable (it took him 15 minutes to determine that my car, was, in fact, there), but from what I could gather they checked the battery and the alternator, found the battery was the problem, replaced it, did a road test on it, and everything is fine.

So is this possible? For a battery to be so dead you can't jump it and for all that interior crap to still work?

Edit:forgot to mention that I can't get the car until tomorow morning, and they're now closed, but my obsesive self can't wait that long.

Don't know much about cars, but I'm sure that you need to drive it a little longer than "a few miles" to charge it up. Hopefully someone else here can answer your question!

well, the answer is a bit complicated. First off, it's VERY possible for a battery to run the radio, dome light, even the headlights, and not be able to start the car.

It's also very easy to mess up the jumper connections so that the battery isn't getting enough kick from the donor car to start the car. The negative cable needs to be on a good ground, and sometimes, especially in older cars that have rust and tar and other crap all over 'em, good grounds can be hard to find.

Its very possible the battery is the cause. Its also possible you have bad battery cables or a bad cable connection. When they replaced the battery, they may have replaced the cables (if they even checked them), or gotten lucky in connecting them that they worked.

Well the battery could of held a charge but could of only thrown out enough amperage to engage the starter. But could of had enough amperage to power the lower power consumption devices.

seen a saab battery test out to zero CCA on the midtronix testers, but still power the interior lights. also you can let the car idle to charge a battey up after jumping, so a short roadtest is acceptable.

Thanks guys for the input. It just seems so damned wierd to me. Of course, I'm much happier it being a bum battery than the alternator and all :)

This sort of thing happened to me recently.

Do you have a multimeter? Have someone check the voltage (Not current, you will fry the multimeter! ) while you try to start it. If it really is kerplunk, voltage will read << than 10 volts.

You can power many things with a dying battery, but a starter requires several hundred amps. Computers require a certan number of volts before they are functional. I hope this helps.

I have had batteries go bad over the years, some slowly, and a few at the drop of a hat. If you get 4 years out of a battery, it doesn't owe you anything.