Its that time of year again being stored indoors for the winter.. the battery is completely drained. I hooked up a trickle charger to it today alarm wouldnt stop going off i guess because the battery is so dead.. should i pull the battery out n charge it up and put it back in and set the trickle charge on it ?

or jump/boost it with another vehicle let it run for awhile n set the charger on it ?

what you guys think ?

 

What made the battery drain? Just from sitting?if so it could be a dying cell, if its just dead cause its dead than i would take the battery out, people usually do that if they allow their car to sit through the winter so the battery doesnt slowly deplete or go bad.

 

What kind of battery is it? I would not keep trickle charging it if is depleted. You may need to hook a good battery to it and charge the good battery in turn, charging the "dead" one. That is the proper way to charge a deeply discharged battery.

Last, but most important, why did it drain? Is it a parasitic draw issue, if so that needs to be addressed as soon as practical.

 

For the winter, I remove my battery and store it in the basement, on a board. In the spring, pop the battery back in and start the car. My optima battery didn't even need a charge before starting, it had plenty of juice. Haven't tried to see how a regular battery holds up over the winter, but extreme cold without any activity is what can kill it.

 

I think there are 2 things at play here

first is replacing the dead battery which I wouldn't bother to do until the spring

next is how to store a battery- check RV or boat forums and be sure to target on starting batteries and not deep cycles

69 has a good suggestion about the basement

 

this is a myth what it is is the battery can leak and ruin a concrete floor... somewhere down the line the story was skewed to the concrete can ruin the battery... just google it

 

I am well aware of the "myth", that concrete will drain the power from the battery.
I put the battery on a board to keep it insulated from the colder concrete. Nice try though!

 

WOW

I never heard of that myth. I knew why you were putting a board on the floor was due to the cold of the concrete. I actually would put my boat battery closer to the oil furnace as it was warmer in that part of the basement.

Alas, here we don't put our vehicles away for the winter. Those 60-70 degree days can seem a bit nippy but we endure it :-)

 

Oh wow, 60-70....how ever do you endure that torture?
I'm sure that myth originated from a colder climate area. My garage isn't heated, and it can get pretty cold in the winter. And although the air is a bit nippy in the garage, you wouldn't want to touch the concrete floor with your bare hand for fear of frostbite (almost). Considering the known fact that keeping an inactive battery in the cold will lower it's output level, I can see how setting a battery directly on a freezing cold concrete floor could drain the power level down faster than just being exposed to the cold air. And a battery that drains way down can warp plates, or freeze. Hence the blanket statement myth, setting a battery on concrete will kill the battery. There's some truth behind the myth.

 

I'm not worried about the cold its 73 here now