Hello this is Yussie Becker again from Titan Service Center. I hope this message finds you and your family healthy and we’ll and that you are all managing as best as possible during these times. After receiving an inordinate number of phone calls about the same problem from many customers I decided it best to send out this message. The problem concerns dead batteries. Many people are calling saying they drove their car to the store (for example) and then it didn’t restart when they came out. The problem is since many people are staying home their cars are sitting without use for extended periods of time. Then after this long time of non operation they start it but only drive a mile or two and shut it off again. Herein lies the problem.
The car uses a very large amount of energy from the battery to start the car. Ordinarily this isn’t a problem because at this point normally one would then drive the car for a significant amount of time thereby allowing the alternator to do its job and recharge the battery to replenish the energy used in the startup. Nowadays before the alternator has a chance to do anything the car is shut off again. Then 20 minutes later it’s started again to take you home and even more energy is sapped from the battery. And then once again before the alternator has a chance you’re home and the car is shut off again. This trip for the car’s sake only resulted in taking a significant amount of energy from the battery without really putting any of it back. This coming after a period of time during which the car had just sat for a long time combined with a couple more trips like the one described will inevitably result in a dead battery at some point. The important thing to know here is that just because the battery went dead does not necessarily mean you need a new one even if you find that it died again after jumping it and driving it some. It’s very possible that all it needs is to be put on a battery charger for 45 minutes to an hour to restore it to it’s original capacity and it’ll be just about good as new.
In fact, to date, of all the cars that have come in to the shop for this issue not one ended up needing a new battery. Simply putting it on a charge for an hour brought the battery back to life. I’ve seen talk about dozens of batteries being replaced lately by other mechanics. And maybe those vehicles truly did need new batteries but everyone should be aware of what I explained here and before agreeing to changing a battery during this time to ask the mechanic for the diagnostic printout from the test done on your battery that shows that it must be replaced.
In addition, I would also recommend that to avoid this whole problem to begin with to try and take each of your cars on a 20 minute drive every other week to keep the battery healthy. Every or every other day is certainly not necessary. Also I advise driving it instead of leaving it idle for 20 minutes as this is better for the car and avoids the chance of someone getting in and taking off with it (unsupervised children included). Anyway those are my thoughts on the subject and thought the community could benefit from them. If you have any questions, as always, feel free to contact me. Bsuros Tovos!
