Quote:
Originally Posted by orange4boy
An old battery that does not take a charge properly can rob you of FE as the alt is constantly trying to charge it.
On short trips your battery can become discharged and not have enough time to recharge. This costs gas and shortens battery life as batteries become sulfated when they sit even slightly discharged. The best thing to do is install a battery tender and plug it in when you are parked or get one of those solar trickle chargers.
You could get yourself a deep cycle battery like a yellow top when you replace your existing battery and run alternator free for commutes and medium length trips. Just recharge it at home and connect your alt for long trips.
The reason I found this forum was my alternator belt was squealing when I started every morning trying to recharge my dead battery and my FE sucked. So I looked into running without alt and found the posts here on alt less life. Now I'm getting much better FE and my batteries will pay for themselves pretty soon.
Good luck
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About how long will a deep cell battery last without being charged if you're using say, lights, heater blower since winter is coming up and windshield wipers in case of rain? Does anyone have any idea?