So my car battery just died, any recommendation for a portable car jump starter?

Mikoyan

Mikoyan

Mikoyan

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Hey people,

My car battery just died, and im getting someone out to check if it needs replacing or charging however I just thought what happens if I was out of nowhere what would I do :O

Do any of you recommend any portable car jump starters?

Cheers :)
 
I purchased one of these from Halfords .Only as my Honda Accord Exec used to be terrible for draining even a new battery. For the sake of £100 it's a handy unit and have used it for inflating, charging phone whilst camping and other such stuff. Highly recommended if your battery is in good condition and it just the car that drains it.
 
[TW]Fox;20831787 said:
Are you sure its worth it? Once you have a decent battery you won't have a problem again for years.
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Exactly this. I had a portable jump start pack that I used to use as a compressor as well so it got charged fairly regularly. In the end the battery in it didn't hold a decent charge anymore by which point it was about 5 years old.

How many times did I use it to jump start a car in that time?... Zero!
 
90% of portable power stations are sat under piles of stuff in garages with batteries so dead they're unchargeable. Don't bother, get a good battery for your car and fix its problem
 
In emergency situations make sure your phone battery is charged and call your mate for a jumpstart from his car and save yourself the bother.
 
I have one, very useful.

I'd rather hook a jump pack up to my Mercedes than risk detonating every single electronic component in the car by connecting it to another car. They are also useful in other circumstances, such as quickly inflating a tyre or when camping or similar they can be used to power 12v stuff in a tent without risking killing the car's battery.

Last time I used it was when I didn't drive the MX-5 anywhere for about 6 weeks and the alarm killed the battery. The battery is in the boot and it was parked right up to the house on the driveway. I'd have needed longcat-length jump leads to get to that, jump pack was 100x easier :)
 
In the same vein as BMW I believe. Has a line in the manual explicitly forbidding jump starting.

The whole electronics going boom thing is largely scaremongering (though it has done over some cars in the states if you believe the stories on the merc forums) but with almost every individual component costing upwards of £1000, I am not ever going to risk it.

EDIT: http://mbworld.org/forums/s-class-w220/337782-problems-after-jump-start.html

Just one example of squillions. That list of stuff that broke would be comfortably enough to write off almost every W220 S-Class on the road today (turns out his was just one module and a load of near misses, but still...). Probably even some W221s...
 
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Is there some magical difference between a 12v jump pack with a car battery inside it and a 12v car battery in a car..


Fried electronics horse****
 
Scubascorpion, since you work in a garage (I think) you're probably a good person to ask.

What's the correct way to use jump leads?

Some say to connect up battery to battery, other's say connect positive to positive, then connect the negative from the working battery to your engine block...
 
I've always done Positive to positive and negative to block

(shortest possible route to/from the starter)
 
Dogbreath said:
:confused: Do Mercedes have extraordinarily fragile electronics then?
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Not just mercs but a lot of new cars, some even to the point that using a diagnostic machine without a 14v supply connected to the battery can cause damage to the ECU's.

Despite having 12v stickers everywhere cars are not actually 12v even the batteries are actually closer to 13v (6 cells of 2.2v each), ecus and modules are designed to work with 14v, a simple example is a passat with electric handbrakes, you have to release the rear motors using diagnostics in a ignition on/engine off state and doing so without a 14v supply has a good chance of damaging the ecu. I called BS on this until it actually to our sister garage.


Some mercs and maybe other newer cars have a built in feature where the car will refuse to attempt crank over if the battery power is insufficient and the volt drop via drain from the starter could damage the electrics. In such cases bump starting would be a very bad idea.

Yet another case of older cars actually being better.
 
[TW]Fox;20836066 said:
A decent battery charger > jumppack?
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Not when you need to leave then and there? You'll only find your battery is dead just as you are about to leave (or are away from the house!). No charger will save you in that situation.

Scubascorpion, just go and have a search, you'll find many tales of woe of people jump-starting W220s and then having loads of electrical problems. I'd rationalised that hooking up a jump pack is just another battery rather than a running car. Might be floating ground issues or anything? Dalin80s experience on some cars clearly agrees too.
 
Does it really happen to you often enough to buy a jump starter? Surely once the battery is replaced it won't happen again for years?
 
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