Interstate batteries dead?

[gss036]

I was going to go fishing this morning, went out hooked the boat up and did not have any power to tilt the big engine. Checked everything and made the battery switch was on both batteries, not an ounce of power. Put the charger on for about 4 hours, one picked up a little charge , but the other one stayed dead! dead! dead!. They were just installed last May 08 and I used the boat 2 1/2 weeks ago and all was fine. I called the boat yard and talked with them, the first guy started the antics about overnight charging, spoke with the guy who runs the place and he called back after about 10 minutes and said they were under warranty and he was coming up my way tomorrow and would swap them out for me. I like that for service, but I always thought interstate made good batteries.
I know a few years ago in my Ford w/a diesel engine, both batteries puked the same way, but they were like 4 years old, would not expect that in 10 months. They were like $180 for the pair. At least they are replacing them for me.
Any body ever have that happen to them??

 

[mthieme]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

It's not impossible to get a bad battery off the shelf. Way back when I was an auto mechanic, we sold Interstate batteries. Once in a while we ran across a bad one. Although frustrating for the customer, Interstate backs up their product.
You might want to test for a short simply by putting a test light from thee positive terminal to the positive cable (disconnected). If it lights, you have a short. I'm assuming all accessories were off.

 

[gss036]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

Yes, everything was turned off. That was my first thought, what did I leave on, well nothing I could find. I will just have to start using the master power switch and turn it off. I do have my downriggers wired straight to the battery, one side would work after charging, the other would not. I will install the new batteries tomorrow and make sure it works. The battery on that side would not take a charge, the charger would read all the way to the top and never go down any.

 

[mthieme]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

Well, hopefully it's just the battery. Let us know how it turns out.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

One bad battery is a possibility -- two bad batteries is more than coincidence. Something was left on or there was a drain. If this boat has a radio with a digital display, the clock feature in that radio places a small, but steady draw on the battery and will kill it over several months. But if it was not powered from either of these two batteries that's not the issue.

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

start using a battery maintainer. make sure you motor is charging.

 

[Mark_VTfisherman]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

I use a master kill switch. That way, unless something with the starter goes south, I have everything killed. I don't do it to keep batteries charged- I installed the wiring that way to minimize the unlikely chance of fire-by-wiring in my boat. Just a thought, but I tend to agree that it is not a battery issue. But maybe?

 

[Expidia]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

My Daughter had two batteries bought at the same time last year that both failed to hold a charge.

She bought them at ****'s. ****'s would not do anything for her and told her to contact the manufactuer.

They replaced them both. They may have been interstate made for ****'s.

I recount this story to show that you can just get unlucky and get into a bad run of batteries as her two came from the same lot.

She kept a trickle charger on them and only ran them down to 25% left. That's why she bought two so she could alternate, but yet and they failed to hold a decent charge just over a year later.

After ****'s failed to honor the replacements, I'll buy my next batteries from Walmart. You can't beat Walmart's customer service.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

Discharging a battery to 25% capacity constitutes battery abuse (deep cycle or not).

 

[gss036]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

Well, like I said oginally, when one battery died in my truck, it killed the other one. I am told that is common in trucks if one battery has a bad cell, it will kill the 2nd one. It happend rather fast as I had used the on the last day of Feb.
My brother-in-law had all 4 of his house die in 3 months in his motor home while in storage. He replaced them with interstate batteries.
Hopefully I will have the new batteries today.

 

[Expidia]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

Discharging a battery to 25% capacity constitutes battery abuse (deep cycle or not).

Here is a quote off a battery site:

Starting, Marine, and Deep-Cycle Batteries

Starting (sometimes called SLI, for starting, lighting, ignition) batteries are commonly used to start and run engines. Engine starters need a very large starting current for a very short time. Starting batteries have a large number of thin plates for maximum surface area. The plates are composed of a Lead "sponge", similar in appearance to a very fine foam sponge. This gives a very large surface area, but if deep cycled, this sponge will quickly be consumed and fall to the bottom of the cells. Automotive batteries will generally fail after 30-150 deep cycles if deep cycled, while they may last for thousands of cycles in normal starting use (2-5% discharge).

Deep cycle batteries are designed to be discharged down as much as 80% time after time, and have much thicker plates. The major difference between a true deep cycle battery and others is that the plates are SOLID Lead plates - not sponge. This gives less surface area, thus less "instant" power like starting batteries need.

Expidia say: note the down 80% part. That leave 20% which jives with just about everything I've read when it comes to how to treat deep cycle batteries.

Man you're getting cranky lately, time to get out on your boat again and suck up a little of the fresh air

 

[gss036]

Re: Interstate batteries dead?

The guy dropped off the batteries late yesterday and got them installed this afternoon. I think I found the culprit, there was a crushed set of wires for the downrigger off/on switch, last time I used the boat it was working great, after the batteries were installed,(the downrigger wired straight to the battery) it did not work. The first thing I checked was the 20AMP fuse, blackened, but not burnt through, so itraced the wiring and found the cramped wire which was turning green w/mold like substance. It probable did not low the fuse because it is like a 18-20 guage wire.
Now to get decent weather, doesn't sound good for the next few days, the wind was blowing 25-35 w/higher gust most of the day and predicted to last a couple of days. I was surprised to see snow in the Seattle area today w/winds and power outages.