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As my car has barely been used for about a fortnight, the battery had gone flat and I had to jump start it from my wife's car yesterday.

So, any recommendations for a decent trickle charger, ideally with full reconditioning capability? I've a suspicion the battery is on the way out, as the auto stop/start on the car very rarely kicks in, but if I can keep it going for a bit longer, that would be great.

I've got an Optimate 3 for the motorbike, but it's not powerful enough to do the car battery.

Thanks in advance.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

On a related note, as my car is also going to lie largely unused for a good while, how long and how often would I need to run the engine to keep the battery topped up? Either idling or driving.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Just a thought but would it be better to save the money for a charger towards a new battery?  

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Have a look at the c-tek range - not the cheapest but top quality 

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Unless you really want a nice shiny new charger I would be inclined to suggest disconnecting the battery until you next need the car.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Unless there was something left on, a battery that is noticeably flat after two weeks is going to fail completely next cold snap.

As for chargers, I thought they were dirt cheap from eg Halfords?

In reply to Luke90:

Not great for the engine to be idling for long periods - better to disconnect the battery if you're not going to be trickle charging it (depending on what you're driving, check that it's not going to cause problems with your computer systems being disconnected for a long time).

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Optimate 3 will charge a car battery, it will take a while but would make a perfect trickle charger for a car

In reply to rogersavery:

Interesting, thanks. I didn't think it would do it, as all the pics on the box are of motorbikes, quad bikes, jet skis and similar - basically, small engines with low capacity batteries.

It's actually an Optimate 3 SP, if that makes any difference. Think it says batteries up to 32 Ah.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

I've got a Noco charger that I really rate. I think its called a Genius or similar and seems to charge everything. Its the charger/optimiser for my motorcycle but has been used to successfully charge and condition my van (1.7cdti) and the gf's polo battery (1.4 petrol) quite happily. 

One of the better investments I've made in a while as was getting boring buying motorcycle batteries.

Edit: I think it's this one: https://www.tayna.co.uk/battery-chargers/noco/g1100/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8qzc...

In reply to LastBoyScout:

As a tangent to this, can someone recommend not a charger but a portable device to attach to the battery to just get the starter motor started? 
For the sake of simplicity just imagine that my house is on an "absolutely no stopping" sort of "red route" and the car is parked about 120 metres away. 
I'd need something I can charge up from mains at home, that will then zap the battery into brief life if not totally charging it. 
I think I used to have such a thing and gave it away!

In reply to LastBoyScout:

That'll be fine to keep it ready for when you do use it.

In reply to timjones:

Not if you're running a Peugeot 206, you might well fook the EMU unit up and never get your car running again, without major expense.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Another vote for C-Tek Lots of car showrooms use something similar. We use one for our leisure battery for our tourer.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Optimate will work. I used one for ages on a car that wasn't worth much more than the price of a new battery. I wired a plug in to make it easy, and hooked it up to the Optimate every time I parked. 

In reply to Blue Straggler:

Loads of these on Amazon, just search for jump starter. About the size of a paperback book and will start a decent sized car. They contain a Lithium battery, which makes me a bit nervous about buying one that's a bit too cheap.

In reply to LastBoyScout:

I was only thinking about this this morning, so I chucked the car on charge for an hour this afternoon while it was sunny. 

In reply to Hooo:

Thanks, everyone - I'll give the Optimate a go.

Car's actually gone into the garage today to have some work done and they're going to put it on their charger while it's there.

I expect I'll end up getting a new battery later in the year, but if I can put that off for a while, then great.

In reply to Hooo:

Thanks. My car has a particularly big battery so I guess if it goes flat it will need a bigger “kick”. I’ll see what I can find. 

In reply to Blue Straggler:

I routinely leave a car for months at a time. The best solution I have found to getting it up and running is to have a separate jump-start battery of high capacity that I charge up before I go away. This holds its charge (and if it did not, could be charged up again quite quickly). Once I get the car started up, I leave it running for several hours and drive it for several miles. By then the car battery has usually recovered. 

In reply to LastBoyScout:

youtube.com/watch?v=AIT4BYJ2jCg&

In reply to John Stainforth:

Your post is not clear. Do you mean you have a whole spare car battery that you keep charged, and use it to “zap” the battery in the car by touching it onto terminals whilst someone is firing the ignition? 
 

Note that my car is parked about 120 metres from my home and on a public road. Leaving it running for several hours has a few issues 😃

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Timely. I was going to start a thread on this. My car wouldn’t start this evening. I was wondering if it’s a sign of a battery on the way out anyway, or if I should just get a jump and drive around for a bit. At this time though that would be the definition of ‘unnecessary travel’. So many crazy knock-ons of this pandemic! 

In reply to ChrisBrooke:

Modern cars drain batteries fast it seems.  I’ve had mine on a maintenance charger since lockdown.

In reply to Blue Straggler:

It is not a duplicate of the car battery, but a large battery of similar capacity but with jump leads. I carefully attach the jump leads to the battery and engine chassis and then start the car up. That is in America; I haven't yet had to do the same here, so I don't know whether similar batteries are sold here - I presume so.

In reply to wintertree:

That's tame. My Dad used to work in batteries with a military bias - I've seen some of the test videos and you can imagine what sort of things they put batteries through to mimic battlefield scenarios!

In reply to Blue Straggler:

There's different kinds of jump starters, ones with batteries, ones with capacitors and hybrid ones. The small li-ion ones are generally garbage but might work if it's just a low-voltage problem (if the circuit voltage in the car is too low the injection system doesn't work and usually the immobiliser doesn't cut out either).  There are also capacitor ones which charge up from the residual power in the car battery and then dump this back at a higher voltage, how well they work I've no idea.

Cheap solar chargers specifically for your problem are readily available to throw on the dash and plug into the accessory socket.

In reply to krikoman:

How do you change the battery without such a problem.

General question - if you went away for a week or two on holiday doesn't your car start when you get back? 

In reply to jimtitt:

A lot of cars only power the accessory socket when turn on...

In reply to wintertree:

That's why they also come supplied with an extension cable and alligator clips to connect to the battery..........

In reply to wbo2:

You connect a settings saver (a small battery) across the terminals first. Some cars just removing the battery screws up the injection settings and they run lumpy until they re-learn the parameters, some it's more of a problem. And the radio code of course!

In reply to The Thread:

Caveat: I know nothing about cars, apart from how to drive one.

So, with a car battery that has died, sat on the drive, can I just hook up something like this: https://www.argos.co.uk/product/7094538 for the correct period and that should see me right?

Thanks, Chris.

In reply to ChrisBrooke:

It depends on how dead it is and for how long it's been dead. A properly flat battery eventually will be fooked forever. Sometimes they can be brought back to life, but other time the damage is permanent.

Good luck

In reply to krikoman:

I've got a LACME Supermatic 12-24, French job.
It resurrected a stone dead battery which had been sat in my backyard for about 5 years.
Took it about three days to do it though.  Occasionally hook it up now and again and it quickly goes into 'Maintain' mode, presumably trickle charging.

In reply to jimtitt:

You did say “plug in to the accessory socket”......... In most modern cars it’ll be a pig of a job to run the wires from the dashboard to the engine bay...

In reply to wintertree:

Step 1; open door.

Step 2 ; open bonnet.

Step 3; locate battery poles or auxiliary start connection points (under red cover).

Step 4; connect panel using the clips supplied and place on dash/fix to window facing sun.

Step 5; close bonnet

Step 6; close door.

In reply to jimtitt:

Step 7; hope the door doesn't crush/short/cut the cables and that you don't damage any door seals?  Or are they a lot more forgiving than I'm imagining?

I stand by my first point though - people need to check if their aux socket is live or not when the ignition is off before plugging a solar maintainer into it...

In reply to krikoman:

Ta. It’s only been a few days since I last drove. But perhaps it’s the cumulative effect of having been driven for about 10 mins, three times in the last fortnight. Electrics still come on, but it won’t start the engine. So I’m hoping it can be revived with a charger. 

In reply to ChrisBrooke:

Worth a try definitely, if it does the electrics then it's not totally flat, so you stand a chance.

In reply to Taylor's Landlord:

Nice one

In reply to LastBoyScout:

My Battery died last week.  I had left my car parked up with the dashcam plugged in for 4 days. It had enough to try to turn the engine, but died leaving the windows down, and the spoiler popped up. So I plugged in my trickle charger by rigging an extension cable across the road. Left it charging for 5 hours, and the voltage was still not rising. Had a new battery delivered yesterday and all is well with it now.  I've also bought a "jump starter" in case i need it in the future.

I can't really rig up a trickle charge for it due to where i can park, but may consider putting it on my tiny lawn and pavement

In reply to LastBoyScout:  ok, devils advocate question as some of this stuff strikes me as a bit odd.  I'm planning a trip for later this summer where I'll drive to Jotunheim and be away from the car a week plus.  What I'm getting from the above is that most of you wouldn't expect the car to start? 

I'm taking a Tesla I think

In reply to wbo2:

I've left my car untouched for 2-3 weeks several times since I bought it 4 years ago and it's only failed me (in terms of having to jump-start it) on one such occasion; I think it happened to be very cold that time as well, and probably not 3 weeks of "neglect". At that point, I also decided to replace the battery which was by then 14 years old (the original from factory)
I have had the occasional trouble where it feels like it's not going to start, actually one quite recently after 2.5 weeks of being untouched, but a bit of willpower and swearing (and no other tricks at all) managed to get it started. 

I would be shocked if it didn't start after leaving it for a week. 
As mentioned in an earlier post, the battery on my car is quite large, something like this, which probably helps
https://www.tarmacsportz.co.uk/nissan/nissan-350z/bosch-nissan-350z-03-09-s...

In reply to krikoman:

(If not raised already) A modern battery charger will not charge a totally flat battery. Before such a charger gets to work it electronically interrogates the flat battery to see how much charge it has left and then can decide how to recharge it. The charger will automatically change the charging rate throughout the process so as to do it effectively and safely. The problem is with a totally dead battery the charger can not recognise it as a battery and will not even try. It’s no different to if you hooked the charger up to a lump of wood. To get round it connect the totally dead battery to a decent one with jump leads and leave it for a few hours. If you have another one. Enough charge will move across for the charger to then do it’s stuff and finish the job. This has worked on a diesel Land Rover battery that was only a few months old but the car had been unused in the garage during winter and it was utterly flat. Now it’s perfectly serviceable. If the battery is past it just get a new one

In reply to LastBoyScout:

Halfords do a 6 in 1 boost starter pack for £75 and I bought one the other day for exactly the same reason you have, the big benefit is that once you have started the car you can throw it in the boot and if you are away from home and have no access to mains power  then you have an instant way of starting your car without involving anyone else.

its not cheap at £75 but a very handy thing to have and a lot more flexible than a simple charger.it it also has a mini compressor built in and a few other extras. I sleep in the car occasionally when out doing the hills and it will be a good source of power and light without running anything of the car battery.