Your really should fully charge the battery. I have seen batteries come around after 8 hours of charging on a good charger. 24 hours on a cheap home charger.

If the battery has sat for a long time over its life (like at a garage) you could have a build up on the plates. A SMALL 3" drop could add a couple of years to the battery. Do this before you charge it. Use a little common sense and cover the battery with a tarp or something. I have done this and seen it done a great many times and I have never seen an issue BUT if your battery is defective it may splash. A 3" drop should not be any worse than a car hitting a PA pot hole

 

I'm wondering if it's the meter. It USED to be that I could put the probes on and instantly have a reading. Now when you do it, it goes all over the place and wont stay on a number for like 15 seconds.

 

Clean the surface the leads are touching.

 

Did that and it's normal so guess it's not the meter.

Battery is 11.71 right now. I'll see what it is when running when I decide to crank or drive it or later this evening. Heat is better in any car but that one. We're 44 degrees with 45+ mph winds right now. Not used to that down here.

 

I see nothing wrong with your battery, its not "dead". It held 11.79 volts for two days which means you don't have a parasitic draw. And being slightly under 12 volts after it sits a while ain't a big deal. A battery has 6 cells, 2 volts each. If it had a bad cell you would be in the 10 volt or under range. Besides, amps is the driving force, not volts.

 

Biggest positive to all this is it IS cranking the car so it can't be all THAT bad, right? I think that whenr it was dead that one afternoon from leaving those lights on the rear view mirror, if I had just put it on charger rather than jumping then I would of just left it alone. I accidentally flipped the light switch when I was getting down on the ground to see best place to put speaker wire. I *thought* I had turned them off but hadn't because they were on when the jumper cables were attached.

 

Fwiw, every good battery I've ever had and checked wasn't quite up to 12 volts after sitting a short while. You have to also remember you have things like radio memory using a small amount of power with the key off too. What you have is considered normal.

 

It dropped a bit more to 11.67 but cranked easy. Was 14volts even right after cranking.

 

Yes after you start the motor you should jump up to above 14 and was the battery is charged it will fall back to just below 14. It could spike as high as 15 volts if your battery is really low and drawing a lot from the alternator. A full charged battery in good condition should read 12.6 volts. 2.1 volts per cell.

Since you have other car that do not have an issue try your volt meter on them. See what reading you get.

 

Well after driving a good bit today it was 12.25. That's as high as I've seen in a week.


Good idea. Why haven't I thought of that