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spikyone

Batteries and alarms

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Put a new 65Ah battery in my car last year after the old one went flat with a couple of weeks' downtime. Now the new one is flat after a week of not using the car - admittedly I've only been using it for fairly short journeys but I used to do similar on the stock battery and that didn't seem to drain so quickly.

Tried to jump it with a jump starter, but that just sets the alarm off every few seconds, which can't be helping with the battery charge. Can the alarm be disabled without having the ignition on so it's actually got half a chance of holding some charge? It seems a bit self-defeating to keep using electrical power when it doesn't have much!

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I've got exactly the same problem, new battery last year now dead. I can't seem to disable the alarm, there is a keypad in the glovebox that should correspond to the code in the alarm manual. Doesn't seem to work for me.

My jump starter also doesn't seem to work this time, it shuts itself off within a couple seconds. I'm going to have another attempt using jump leads and another vehicle soon!

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Might be worth investing in a CTEK charger and keep the connectors on. Use it to charge the battery every few weeks. Buy a 7.5A one not 5A as that takes 12 hrs to charge, so too slow in my opinion.

Sent from my SM-G781B using Tapatalk

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Unfortunately my car's not close enough to the house to keep it on a trickle charger. I've ordered the AA-branded charger/conditioner from Amazon, I'm just going to pull the battery out and use that to charge it. I'll have to make sure I drive it more, lockdown really can't end soon enough...

Also had the fun of the mechanical key not working, so I've now got a proper one cut for emergencies.

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Don't know if this is relevant but when I was talking to a Subaru dealer when I took the Forester in for a new battery he advised that the battery drain is caused by the keyless entry rather than the alarm. On the Forester you can disable the keyless entry to reduce the battery drain. Haven't checked yet to see if this can be done on the 86.

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I’ve turned off the keyless entry already, you can do it with TIS software. I’m not sure I’d recommend it to be honest, having to place the key fob next to the start button every time you start the engine is a pain. 

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14 minutes ago, maurice said:

I’ve turned off the keyless entry already, you can do it with TIS software. I’m not sure I’d recommend it to be honest, having to place the key fob next to the start button every time you start the engine is a pain. 

I gather from from your comment that turning off keyless entry on the 86 obviously isn't a solution to battery drain. 

 

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Unfortunately my car's not close enough to the house to keep it on a trickle charger. I've ordered the AA-branded charger/conditioner from Amazon, I'm just going to pull the battery out and use that to charge it. I'll have to make sure I drive it more, lockdown really can't end soon enough...

Also had the fun of the mechanical key not working, so I've now got a proper one cut for emergencies.

My car never did it before lockdown as it was a daily being used 6 days / week , 50 miles a day. Its also parked on the drive, far from a plug socket. So my approach is get the extension roll that I use for the lawnmower, see a good day and connect the Ctek. Battery charges in 6 hrs and in goes the ctek and extension. Important to buy the 7.5 or 10A one not 5A as that takes 12 hrs to charge fully.

 

What I meant by a permanent connector was this which you can leave on your battery. Makes connecting and disconnecting a doddle.

https://www.ctek.com/uk/products/car/connect-eyelet-m6

 

 

Sent from my SM-G781B using Tapatalk

 

 

 

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7 hours ago, BRZ-123 said:

My car never did it before lockdown as it was a daily being used 6 days / week , 50 miles a day. Its also parked on the drive, far from a plug socket. So my approach is get the extension roll that I use for the lawnmower, see a good day and connect the Ctek. Battery charges in 6 hrs and in goes the ctek and extension. Important to buy the 7.5 or 10A one not 5A as that takes 12 hrs to charge fully.

 

What I meant by a permanent connector was this which you can leave on your battery. Makes connecting and disconnecting a doddle.

https://www.ctek.com/uk/products/car/connect-eyelet-m6

 

 

Sent from my SM-G781B using Tapatalk

 

 

 

Yeah I knew what you meant. I can't even use an extension lead from my house to the car; it's one of those new build estates and my car's in front of my garage, which isn't attached to my house. I can't have a power supply in the garage as it's under a coach house (fortunate, after the idiot who lives there flooded it a couple of weeks ago!)

16 hours ago, Gray said:

Don't know if this is relevant but when I was talking to a Subaru dealer when I took the Forester in for a new battery he advised that the battery drain is caused by the keyless entry rather than the alarm. On the Forester you can disable the keyless entry to reduce the battery drain. Haven't checked yet to see if this can be done on the 86.

The battery's already dead, I just wanted to turn the alarm off so it doesn't sound whilst the jump starter is connected, seems stupid to have the car doing stuff that uses the charge (sounding the alarm and flashing the indicators) when the battery's already low. You'd think that it would detect the key being in/near the car and stop the alarm activating.

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