P38A Battery, to disconnect or not.

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swac

Active Member
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148
Location
walsall
Good afternoon Gentlemen,
I'd like to get fellow owners thoughts on this; I have to leave the RR at the airport for about 3 weeks and I am trying to decide on whether to disconnect the battery or not. I had a dreadful time after I left it for about 10 weeks once and the battery went flat whilst connected. To be honest I've left it for a couple of weeks since on the drive at home and the battery has been fine but the last I want is to return to Heathrow after 17 hours travelling to find it flat.
 
swac said:
Good afternoon Gentlemen,
I'd like to get fellow owners thoughts on this; I have to leave the RR at the airport for about 3 weeks and I am trying to decide on whether to disconnect the battery or not. I had a dreadful time after I left it for about 10 weeks once and the battery went flat whilst connected. To be honest I've left it for a couple of weeks since on the drive at home and the battery has been fine but the last I want is to return to Heathrow after 17 hours travelling to find it flat.
Click to expand...
I would say get another battery, put it in the boot, leave the one connected, if no start then use the one in the boot, or park at someone's house?
 
I bought a jump starter to deal with exactly that possibility. Small enough to leave it in the cubby box (defender). Not needed it yet, but just in case----.
 
Get one of Marty's fob filters, or disconnect the Fob Receiver Antenna. Most airports have got so much radio crap these days, they are bound to wake up the BECM & flatten battery.
 
I'd say you're asking for more trouble by disconnecting it for that long, unless you are well practiced at putting your EKA in etc. You can get jump started at Airport parking anyway if needed
 
Dopey said:
I would say get another battery, put it in the boot, leave the one connected, if no start then use the one in the boot, or park at someone's house?
Click to expand...
Unfortunately I don’t know anyone who lives near Heathrow and I think my last battery wasn’t cheap.
 
Wimblowdriver said:
I bought a jump starter to deal with exactly that possibility. Small enough to leave it in the cubby box (defender). Not needed it yet, but just in case----.
Click to expand...
I thought about that option but if battery goes flat I have to enter the EKA and you don’t want to be doi that after 17hours travel.
 
Business or personal trip ? If business take an Uber & expense it. If personal, the long stay parking is gonna be £150, so weigh that against trains (£30 to £80 return) & taxis.
 
It has a lot more cars in it now, I downloaded the updates

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I have a Suaoki 1000A, 12000Ah lithium booster pack and starts my 2.5 diesel no trouble. Can be used to run/charge phones, tablets etc
 
pre-lockdown I was going overseas fairly often and would always disconnect my battery, for up to 3 weeks at a time, and never had an issue.

Make sure the car is unlocked when you disconnect (it will return to the same state when the battery is reconnected), you can of course lock it with the sill buttons, and door lock, after that. And sure, take the EKA procedure/ EKA code with you, but I doubt you'll need it. BTW, the EKA disable feature will ensure that if immobilised the car doesn't DEMAND the EKA, but it will still ACCEPT the EKA, if your key/fob doesn't clear the immobilisation, so still worth keeping the EKA info to hand. If you let the battery go flat while connected then it's pretty much certain that you will get immobilised - and so you may as well disconnect the battery when it's pretty much certain you won't get immobilised/ need the EKA.

I assume you have a working fob and door locks/ microswitches though? If not then all bets are off... Lastly, when you have disconnected the car battery, put the fob somewhere where the lock/ unlock buttons are not going to get pressed (else the fob will lose synch for when you reconnect the battery, and you can't resynch the fob while immobilised).

I've tested all this out on my car (4.6 1998) your model may differ.
 
Dopey said:
I would say get another battery, put it in the boot, leave the one connected, if no start then use the one in the boot, or park at someone's house?
Click to expand...
romanrob said:
pre-lockdown I was going overseas fairly often and would always disconnect my battery, for up to 3 weeks at a time, and never had an issue.

Make sure the car is unlocked when you disconnect (it will return to the same state when the battery is reconnected), you can of course lock it with the sill buttons, and door lock, after that. And sure, take the EKA procedure/ EKA code with you, but I doubt you'll need it. BTW, the EKA disable feature will ensure that if immobilised the car doesn't DEMAND the EKA, but it will still ACCEPT the EKA, if your key/fob doesn't clear the immobilisation, so still worth keeping the EKA info to hand. If you let the battery go flat while connected then it's pretty much certain that you will get immobilised - and so you may as well disconnect the battery when it's pretty much certain you won't get immobilised/ need the EKA.

I assume you have a working fob and door locks/ microswitches though? If not then all bets are off... Lastly, when you have disconnected the car battery, put the fob somewhere where the lock/ unlock buttons are not going to get pressed (else the fob will lose synch for when you reconnect the battery, and you can't resynch the fob while immobilised).

I've tested all this out on my car (4.6 1998) your model may differ.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice. I will disconnect it then. It was okay when I disconnected the battery to do the sump gasket so I think that it should be alright. I'm going to leave the remote in the car and lock it with a spare key. I appreciate the warning about not pressing the buttons on the fob when the battery is disconnected I'd never heard of that before.
 
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