Interstate Batteries

[SPIKER]

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Spiker mentioned a sulfate treatment...care to tell us a little more about it? Brand you like, active ingredients to look for, or some other identifying feature to identify a "good" one? Of course, sulfate treatments and/or replacing acid don't work very well on a sealed "maintenance forbidden" battery...
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No specific brand, they used to sell it at HF and that is where I got the 2nd bottle from, the first was either NAPA or a local battery place cant remember now. Bottle was not cheap but sure seemed to help it last a long time. At one time that mail order cat, JC-whitney had it too but I have not gotten anything from them in a LONG time.'

Mark

 

[Fawken]

Update: Got the new battery today well packed and looks good (black vs the original red). It slides right into the drill and charger no issues. Came fully charged and spun the drill very fast. True test will be drilling some one inch holes through a concrete wall and seeing how long it lasts of course. But for less than $80 I'm a happy camper so far.

 

[Garandman]

I have resigned to the belief that batteries are being designed with planned obsolescence. My old Chevy Delco battery (1978) lasted nine years. My first cell phone battery (1999) lasted eight years. My old boat batteries (2002) lasted 10 years.

Now new Diehard in my car (2012) lasted two years ($324). Napa battery (2010) in truck lasted 1 1/2 years. Interstate battery (2009) in my tractor three years.
I have decided to go with Walmart batteries and just keep replacing them on warranty every three years since they have one of the best warranties offered now and better prices.

We have a fleet of eight vehicles. We've only replaced one in less than 6-7 and that was on warranty. But the cars are driven a lot. Two are Red Top AGM's, one is a Odyssey/Diehard Platinum, and the rest are Interstate or Costco (both made by Johnson Controls).

 

[ultrarunner]

Use to sell Interstate at the Dealership... was a real good battery and priced right.

I no longer buy them since our good as gold jobber was forced out and he had a few choice things to say about declining quality.

Best Service ever was 12 years with a AC Delco "Green Eye" and Costco use to also sell these.

Best Battery Buy ever was from JC Penny... it had a lifetime warranty and got 22 years from that purchase up to the time the car was totaled...

We also had a battery additive called VX1 or something like that?

Very interested in your thoughts from field use with the tool battery line.

 

[oldpilgrim]

Anyone heard of DEKA batteries? Possibly it's a regional thing. They seem to be quite common and as good as any other around here.

 

[Garandman]

Anyone heard of DEKA batteries? Possibly it's a regional thing. They seem to be quite common and as good as any other around here.

DEKA is an excellent brand. They are made by East Penn Manufacturing and have both AGM and conventional flooded cell batteries.

Harley OEM batteries are Deka and worth the money IMHO.

Along with DEKA supposedly they make some NAPA batteries but those contracts can change. I bought a marine battery at West Marine a few years ago that was made by East Penn, and when I went back a year or two later they were made by JC.

 

[AaronS]

I've heard Dekas are great too. I called Napa 6 weeks ago to see what they had as far as marine cranking batteries and trolling batteries and was told only Napa brand. They told me they were made by Deka. I checked online reviews and Deka was reviewed favorably without fail, while Interstate was reviewed pretty poorly. The boat now has one new Napa cranking battery and two new Napa trolling batteries.

 

[Garandman]

BTW Interstate sells three different grades of standard battery plus an AGM.

Their AGM has a 48 month replacement while their entry grade is 30 months and Commercial 36. They are rated just as highly as anything else in CR.

 

[muddstopper]

Has anybody every tried restoreing a old lead acid battery. I read, online no less, some russian dude had developed a method to restore old lead acid batteries that would no longer hold a charge. His method only worked for batteries that had not shorted out or had burn up plates. Anyway, his method was to completely drain the voltage from the battery and then hook a small battery charger up in reverse and charge the battery backwards. Supposely by reversing the electrical flow, the corrosion that had built up on the plates would flick off. After the reverse charging process, the battery was drained of the acid and flushed with water to remove the deposits, refilled with new acid and then charge properly. I have heard this actually works, but have never tried it myself.

 

[ultrarunner]

There use to be a small shop in town that rebuilt batteries... when they had the hard rubber case and the top was sealed with tar.

When I asked how it was done... it was basically taken apart, inspected for damage, given a good cleaning, the electrolyte strained/filtered and put back together.

Damage was often warped plates from heat, broken from vibration, or simply too far gone in thickness.

The old guy said most of the time... it was just a build up in the bottom of the case...

Entire shop was maybe 20 x 60... with vats, wood racks and rubber topped benches....

Did notice the owner did not have any teeth...

 

[oldpilgrim]

The old guy said most of the time... it was just a build up in the bottom of the case...

years ago I took a couple of batteries, dumped all the acid out, hosed the battery out, upside down, flushing all the sediment out of the bottom of the battery. Refilled with fresh acid and VIOLA ! They worked again. This removed the build up that shorted on the bottom of the plates.

They didn't last long, a few month maybe, so it wasn't worth the effort. I'd guess that the plates probably didn't have that much material remaining.

 

[SPIKER]

years ago I took a couple of batteries, dumped all the acid out, hosed the battery out, upside down, flushing all the sediment out of the bottom of the battery. Refilled with fresh acid and VIOLA ! They worked again. This removed the build up that shorted on the bottom of the plates.

They didn't last long, a few month maybe, so it wasn't worth the effort. I'd guess that the plates probably didn't have that much material remaining.

I also tried this once with the same results on one and the other must have been a broken plate as it would only charge to 11 volts.

What I ended up with was a bunch of toxic lead crap that I filtered out of the old acid and after the failed try I scrapped it back into the old battery prior to scrapping it for 20cents a lb.

M

 

[SPYDERLK]

years ago I took a couple of batteries, dumped all the acid out, hosed the battery out, upside down, flushing all the sediment out of the bottom of the battery. Refilled with fresh acid and VIOLA ! They worked again. This removed the build up that shorted on the bottom of the plates.

They didn't last long, a few month maybe, so it wasn't worth the effort. I'd guess that the plates probably didn't have that much material remaining.

... Exact same experience.

 

[Garandman]

They didn't last long, a few month maybe, so it wasn't worth the effort. I'd guess that the plates probably didn't have that much material remaining.

Many modern chargers will disulfate lead-acid batteries.

Sulfation and How to Prevent it - Battery University

You have to pay attention to what you are buying because that doesn't work with AGM bateries.

Just as you can remove metal from rifle barrels by electrolysis, you can remove oxidation from the plates to restore function.

 

[Ken]

Have a Dodge 2500 pick-up year 2005 diesel engine.
About a year ago had one of the battery's quit with no voltage when trying to start the engine .
Replaced the battery's and then opened the one that had failed by cutting the top where the plastic is glued to case. lifting out the plates saw one of the lead rivet's connecting the cells had been pressed in wrong and was loose. with large solder iron melted to rivet and then replaced into the case . This battery is still usual able on a gen/welder is the shop and the voltage same 13.6 when checked after period on non use.
Wonder is that rivet was designed to fail about time warranty was up .??
ken