Has anyone here had problems with optima batteries going bad, and their reluctance to honor the warranty? I have one that is 3 months old that won't hold a charge, and neither the store or the manufacturer will honor it even with my receipt. They claim that is my wiring causing a parasitic leak. I had them charge it to full, check it with a volt meter, then wait 5 minutes and check again...sure enough it would lose charge. They still claim I damaged the battery. Does anyone have any advice on where I should go from here?

 

Wow, that is strange. There must be a loose ground somewhere that is not allowing the battery to have a solid circuit.

But usually optimo batteries are really good for after market ignitions and extra electrical components like stereos and such. Sorry to hear that they are not helping with any of the problems on your battery.

 

i use to like optimas. dont anymore. especially after having problems with them. if they ever go completely dead they have to be trickle charged back up and somethimes they never work right. they are a good battery for most but i wont use them. i now use only exide batteries.

 

This summer, I replaced my 7 year old Optima with another one, so I'm sold. Print out the warranty info in the link below and take it back to them. Yellow and red top is a 36 month, blue is 24 month free replacement. They do state they don't cover abuse, improper installation, etc. so ask them to prove that's what happened to it. A 3 month old Optima to go out like that is not normal, unless maybe you were subjecting it to a constant dead short. http://www.optimabatteries.com/_medi...a_Warranty.pdf

 

The GOOD & BAD opinions on the Optima batteries are out there on every Car Form. From What I read, it is a crapshoot on your results with them. Myself, I would stay away from them.

 

I honesty thought that I had done something wrong myself, however before last week the battery was fine, as was the battery that had been in the car since 1997 that went through the engine swap and a start stop procedure at the body shop for over a year and a half. Since it came on so suddenly, I thought I had a bad ground from my fans. Other than that I have had no other splicing on the car.

Anyways, with the battery removed and on a good charger that has an AMG setting, it will charge full, then immediately loose charge about a .01V/2 seconds. After placing an old battery in the car...it started fine and checked out overnight and did not lose any voltage...

Both the store and optima will still not honor the warranty. I did finally get the store to agree to charge the battery full, and wait a few minutes to see if it holds charge. They stopped short of accusing me of sabotaging the battery to get a new one, but that is the feeling I am getting after speaking with them. This is getting unecessarily ugly. I would have never brought it to them if it were my fault, or a bad alternator, I guess they are used to people trying to rip them off.

 

Sabotaging to get a new one? The damn thing is only three months old, it's still "new". I used to disconnect my old Optima from the 69, and leave it in the trunk for the winter...unattended. Reconnect it in the spring and the engine turned over like it was a fully charged battery. Mind you, I'm not in sunny AZ like you are either. I'm in the arctic zone, even inside the unheated garage. NO other "regular" battery that I've had in the past would hold such a charge for so long....ever. I'd say yours is defective, and it sounds like it's time to raise some he!!. This may be strictly a coincidence, but I noticed the new Optima that I bought is now made by Interstate battery (the old one wasn't as far as I was aware). I've had mostly bad experiences in the past with Interstate's dying before their time.

 

Hi djs383, I'm sorry to hear about the problem you've been having with your battery and I'd like to help. I'd like to learn a little bit more about your situation. You mentioned the battery that was in the car since 1997 was fine. Why did you replace it? Where were you using your Optima before you installed it in this vehicle? Since you mentioned it, what is the parasitic draw on your vehicle? When the battery was charged, what was the voltage after they (or you) finished charging it and what was the voltage after five minutes? I also noticed you indicated the battery would lose about .01 volts every two seconds. How long does it continue to lose voltage at this rate? Finally, what kind of battery charger are you using? I look forward to hearing from you!


Jim McIlvaine
eCare Manager, OPTIMA Batteries, Inc.
www.facebook.com/optimabatteries

 

I had a DEKA battery in the vehicle since 97. I have been restoring the vehicle, and began with an engine/trans swap. I left the deka in after the swap just because the vehicle was headed to the body shop and wasn't street leagal anyway. The year and a half of occasional starting pretty much finished off the deka and the plan was to put a new battery in when I got the car back from the body shop. The day I got it back, I put in the redtop 75/35 (august 2010). It worked just fine until last saturday, then the abovementioned things happened.

There was no parasitic draw as the vendors had expected. The battery would take a full charge which is why the vendor refused to accept it as a return. I should have made him wait and retest with a volt meter. I didn't do that myself until the next time I tried to start it, and boom dead again. That is when I put it on a pro-series charger that has settings for regular, AGM, and gel batteries. It took a charge and I just was curious as to how many volts that was when it was considered full. It ended up being 14.1. For whatever reason I rechecked a few minutes later...just to play with my new volt meter, that is when I noticed it was down to 12.3. So, I just sat there for a minute and held the meter on and watched it drop little by little. In the end I had to re-play that scenario at the vendor in order to get a new battery (new battery seems just fine).

The problem was that this never should have happened, the vendors are just defensive I presume from people constantly trying to rip them off on exchanges or returns. I am also a little upset with myself in that I should have performed these tests myself in the first place. Oh well if this one doesn't last at least 3 months I will know to avoid optima like the plauge. I think I just had a dose of bad luck, it seems others have had positive experiences with them.

 

Hi djs383, every vehicle has some parasitic draw, although typically not enough to cause battery issues. Did the retailer test for a parasitic draw or did you? If it was the retailer, did they tell you how many milliamps the draw was? For anyone else who might be curious, this video explains some basic battery diagnostics, including how to test for a parasitic draw-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yPlx4MBNRU

Fully-charged RedTops should measure approximately 12.6-12.8 volts. 14.1 volts is likely a surface charge that will dissipate on its own after a few hours. When a battery is healthy, it should be able to hold close to the maximum 12.6-12.8 volts for the next 12-24 hours, if it is not connected to a vehicle or any other draw. If yours was dropping down to 12.3 volts after a few minutes of sitting on a bench, there was definitely something wrong with the battery and the retailer did the correct thing by replacing it.


Some of our retailers are quite skeptical of battery returns, because many of the “bad” batteries end up being deeply-discharged and work fine, when properly recharged. We would like to follow up with the retailer on your return, so if you'd be willing, I'd appreciate it if you could PM me the retailer's contact information and your name. Thanks!

Jim McIlvaine
eCare Manager, OPTIMA Batteries, Inc.
www.facebook.com/optimabatteries