Lesson Learned - battery died!

[ALSRAC]

Sorry to hear that, but I'm glad LILTGR is up and running again!! No more hibernation for him please.

[PeteInLongBeach]

In lieu of anything else, you can also just disconnect the battery for extended downtime... Too many parasitic loads on modern cars.

[Kermit]

Originally Posted by mews

.............Got a jump from AAA.......

Wow, I'd think it'd take at least a AA battery to jump start our little cars. Sorry, had to say it.

My dad left the key in the "on" position on his when he went in the house then forgot. I came and picked him up in my car and when we came back later in the day the car was dead. It rained, turned headlights and wipers on - killed everything. Jump started, drove around and it has been fine since. Happened last September.

[smartbetz]

Well, I don't belive that letting your car sit for 3 weeks will require a batter tender. I have vehicles that sit for 3 months without issue. I have had two battery drains on my Smart. The last one was 3 days!

The searches I have ran show their is an issue with the computer program on the 2009 models. Mine is a 2008 and I feel the issue applies to some cars from that model year as well. The problem is tied to the Automatic headlamps. If you leave the switch in Auto it drains the battery. Since leaving my switch in the off possition I have not had a battery drain and the car has sat for over a week.

Joe Lasker and Jim Schmidt still want to see the car at Aristocrat to test the battery and try to diagnose the problem. I will let everyone know what they find out when I get a chance to get it to them to look at.

Shane

[FWOIII]

How do you run the pigtale so it's accessable to the Battery Tender?

[mews]

I will plan to take it in to be checked out although it has not failed to start since the problem came up. I never leave the lights on auto, the radio on or anything else that could drain the battery.

shane, let us know what you find out.

[HGB]

The wife and I celebrated my birthday by going out to Carrabba's for dinner on inauguration day .
When we returned to our vehicle in the typically filled parking lot of the restaurant, we realized that our battery was dead. I mean not one little response from the car as I kept pressing the remote. I already had visions of walking 2 miles home as daylight slowly faded away. Upon looking closer at the smarts rear window I realized that it was surrounded by cloth. I then quickly realized that it was a cabrio with the same color as ours. Our smart was two spaces down and readily responded to the key fob. Small world.

[NuBiker]

Originally Posted by FWOIII

How do you run the pigtale so it's accessable to the Battery Tender?

edited: Oh, I ordered a couple of these:
http://www.whitehorsepress.com/produ...oducts_id=4861

I found this at Walmart. You could splice in a foot of two of 18gauge wire....

[meaux61]

My smart was idle for about a month as it was being repaired after a deer hit it. I would start and go in the garage at the dealership etc but I was worried. I asked them to check the battery and after I insisted, they found that the battery was bad and replaced it. I do believe that there are some early 08 smarts that came over with bad batteries.

Meaux

[smartbetz]

Meaux - Thanks for that note.

I still need mine checked and I believe it to be defective. I have a Mercedes trickle charger (comes with a cigarette ligther/12V accessory plug to charge through your 12v plug under the dash so you dont have to pull the floor up or run anything) and it charged the battery but did not Green light it. So i assume it is bad.

I will post the results when I get it addressed.

HGB - try having a rental car and getting into an identical vehical and wonder why it wont start (they left the doors unlocked) then wondered what happened to my luggage.............. My rental was two spaces over......

Shane