Flat 12v battery - After 6 days!!

[Clocky]

Some advice please. I’ve not used my 2019 2L Corolla in 6 days and the car was completely flat when I tried to unlock it. (First time ever since new.) As the car is kept in the garage and space is very limited, I couldn’t gain access to the boot via the rear door to reach the 12v Battery. Toyota advised to charge the car via the positive terminal in the fuse box under the bonnet but the smart charger I borrowed wouldn’t work for some reason once connected to the positive terminal and negative to the body (if I did it correctly - I’m no expert.) I called out the RAC who used a hand held jump starter (might be called something else) and it allowed me to start the car straight away. When he checked the voltage with his multimeter, it was reading 2.1 V. I asked the chap if I should purchase a trickle charger and leave it the car whilst in the garage but he said that he wouldn’t recommend it. Apparently (so he said) they can damage the electrics and if I wanted to charge the Battery, I’d be best to disconnect the terminals or remove the Battery from the car or use a jump starter.

Sorry for the long comment but in summary, can someone explain if I can safely use a smart charger to keep the battery charged whilst connected to the car without it damaging the hybrid system (or my warranty) or would I be best to use a jump starter? I did see something on the Toyota Blog about running the car in Ready mode for an hour each week. That Seems very excessive to me for a modern car. Surely the battery shouldn’t reduce to nearly zero volts after 6 days (25 mile trip last week.)

Any feedback would be really appreciated.

[Rosgoe]

Can’t believe another Toyota Corolla with a flat Battery! I have not had any problems with my 1.8 2020 excel corolla but I do charge it every couple of weeks during this lockdown using a traditional Battery charger which switches to float charge when full it is a lead acid Battery and yes I do not disconnect it from the car just make sure all power is off and all doors shut but the correct way is to disconnect the earth lead.

I believe that some members on the forum use ctek battery chargers which seem to be ideal especially if yours is an agm battery.

if your battery has gone down to 2.1 volts it will be more than likely U/S as Toyota seem to use starter batteries for the 12v system and the plates can buckle if the battery is allowed to go dead flat.

[FROSTYBALLS]

Does also depend on how the car was used prior to the six days and the 25 mile journey. As regards Battery maintenance, see:

 

[Auris James]

Not a Corolla but have a 2015 Auris hybrid.

Used the car for short runs, last good run week before of 60 miles and 100miles previous week. Went to chippy on Friday. Saturday went local shop all fine. Saturday lunchtime dead! Used other 1996 Volvo for shopping. Called in to Toyota and said bring it in for Battery test. Got back, put shopping away and it fired right up!

Phoned dealer but busy until Monday, so gave it a 40 minute drive. Dropped car off at dealer on Monday, got taxi home and used Volvo. Dealer rang to say car ready in 40 mins, giving it a wash. Arrived in Taxi, dealer said use it more often, every few days. Got to the car all lovely and clean! Car wouldn't start!!

Dealer said what would you like to do? Can jump start it for you or would you like a new Battery fitted for £145 inc vat and fitting? Went for new Battery, but not available as no ETA on arrival. Jump started it and using it more now. So far working. Dealer going to ring me. Chatting to a customer with a 2013 petrol Avensis and he was on his 4th battery!

Dealer has tested the battery twice now and it passes the test, but needs a good run. Apparently the new battery has a slightly higher capacity. 

James👍

[TonyHSD]

Irregular use on short trips is the biggest enemy to all cars batteries, Toyota hybrids has smaller Battery fitted and they suffer even more. My Neighbor drives his car once a month and buys new Battery every 2 years, so does my dad in his vw even though he drives daily but ultra low miles with a lot of stop start involved. Once the car Battery goes flat it looses its capacity and continued short drives will kill it in no time. Fitting a new battery and investing in trickle charger is a good idea especially if you are planning to drive from time to time. 

[Clocky]

Thanks all for the feedback. I’ve borrowed a smart charger (maypole brand) for now and have just connected it to the Battery. It has 12volt standard and 12v AGM options. I’m not sure which Battery I have. It’s a Varta 345 LN1-MF 45Ah Battery. Is that AGM? If so, I will charge it in that mode. I will have a look at the C-Tek chargers so thanks for the advice. I’ll see if the charger does the trick before contacting Peterborough Toyota. 

[Auris James]

6 minutes ago, TonyHSD said:

Irregular use on short trips is the biggest enemy to all cars batteries, Toyota hybrids has smaller battery fitted and they suffer even more. My Neighbor drives his car once a month and buys new battery every 2 years, so does my dad in his vw even though he drives daily but ultra low miles with a lot of stop start involved. Once the car battery goes flat it looses its capacity and continued short drives will kill it in no time. Fitting a new battery and investing in trickle charger is a good idea especially if you are planning to drive from time to time. 

Where I live at a Marina, car is in residents car park, so would need to remove Battery to bring it to boat to put it on charge. Pain really, as a trickle charger left on is ideal if power point near the car. Driving it more, seems easier!

James👍

[Gerg]

45 minutes ago, Auris James said:

Can jump start it for you or would you like a new battery fitted for £145 inc vat and fitting?

I rang the local Toyota dealer last week for an Auris hybrid Battery price - he quoted just under £120. I'm not sure if that was fitted or to take-away. 

Just so you are aware! 

[Auris James]

1 minute ago, Gerg said:

I rang the local Toyota dealer last week for an Auris hybrid battery price - he quoted just under £120. I'm not sure if that was fitted or to take-away. 

Just so you are aware! 

Ok thanks. See what they say when they get one!

James👍

[Rosgoe]

46 minutes ago, Auris James said:

Ok thanks. See what they say when they get one!

James👍

I think those batteries are much cheaper from a Battery shop or euro car parts best to shop around.

[Bob110023]

It would be interesting to know how toyota test a Battery. Where I work we use a hand held tester, if it passes we always recommend to the customer that we recharge and carry out a further test on our grx-3000 discharge tester or the alpha-bat pro tester. While we are carrying out the test over a couple of days we would loan the customer a Battery to keep him on the road. We have had occasions where the hand held has passed a Battery but a proper discharge test has failed the battery.

[Mikw]

I've been sitting in mine a couple of times a week in "Ready" mode for 30 mins. Hope it's enough.

During that 30 mins the engine only fires up once for a couple of minutes, so i don't think it wastes too much fuel

[Deek]

I'm thinking about trading in my Auris 1.8 hybrid for a 2020 Corolla GR Sport. I viewed it at the dealer's yesterday and the Battery was flat as it hadn't been used for a while. I'm on my third Battery with the Auris and know from experience the once the Battery goes flat it never fully recovers capacity, even with a smart charger.

I was speaking to an extremely helpful chap in the Toyota spares depot today and mentioned in passing the 12v battery issue.  He made some interesting points. Apparently Toyota is refusing warranty claims for low mileage users who don't use the car enough to maintain the battery charge. He said Toyota is promoting a trickle charger option but I don't have the details. He also looked up the parts manual and said the new Corolla battery is 45ah vs 35ah for the Auris, its also it's much cheaper (around £70ish from memory). He quoted the part no. 28800-YZZZF but I can't find online apart from a Polish website (and it's a 41ah battery for a Yaris). I'm not sure if this is duff info but if true the simplest remedy is probably to buy a new battery if the old one goes completely flat. 

[FROSTYBALLS]

11 minutes ago, Deek said:

He said Toyota is promoting a trickle charger option but I don't have the details.

See my post from 7.20pm on Wednesday above. 

Toyota included the following within the linked topic as regards trickle/solar chargers:

"If you have a 12V Battery trickle charger, or a solar panel charger, and are confident using them, then these are a good option to keep the Battery fully charged while the vehicle is stationary for a period of time."

[Mooly]

On 2/17/2021 at 7:17 PM, Rosgoe said:

Can’t believe another Toyota Corolla with a flat battery!

I was thinking the same thing. So many Battery related complaints at the moment. The bottom line in all this is that either 'something' is waking up and drawing current when it shouldn't or the quiescent current drain is just to high. Anything over 50 milliamps (which sounds peanuts) will take a toll over days and weeks... example... 50 milliamps is just 1.2 amp hours removed from the Battery over 24 hours. Its nothing... but now imagine its like that for a week. That's 8.4 amp hours gone from a Battery of around 30 to 40 amp hour capacity. You drive it for 60 minutes but supposing it only charges at a 5 amps maximum. It doesn't get fully charged... and then you leave it again. Its a slow and downward spiral on its state of charge. And that is just for 50 milliamps current draw... what is it really pulling 24/7. That is the big question.     

It would be very very instructive for a dealer (for example) to rig a car up with a monitor to see what the current is over an extended period of several days. Or to get that info from Toyota. It is a basic design specification, the info should be available somewhere. 

It would also be very very useful to know what rate the car is capable of charging the battery at. I suspect 'probably not a very high rate' seeing as the voltage has to be derived from the high voltage battery but it would be massively useful info and would give a good figure to work to when wondering how long you have to drive for or leave it in ready mode for. 

[Timh21]

Even though Ive not had any issues I still find it a bit odd that my new Corolla 12V Battery still only shows 12.5v after using the car every day for the last 4 weeks, most days minimum 100 miles. My tiny (In comparison) 16Ah motorcycle Battery is still showing 12.9v having sat for a week outside and has never been on any form of Battery charger in 2 years??

[AndrueC]

Took my car off its trickle charger yesterday and took her for a spin around local roads. There was an odd ticking from the back that I couldn't locate but it stopped soon after I left the house. All in all she ran beautifully. I even had a chance to demonstrate to an Audi driver the difference between a 60mph zone (A43 to my estate entrance) and a 50mph zone (my estate entrance to all points west. Don't think they noticed though. They overtook and scampered off into the distance(*) at the first opportunity.

(*)Which was an HGV and they remained stuck behind that until they reached a dual carriageway eight miles further on. I got to look at the scenery. They got to stare at the **** end of an HGV.

[Deek]

2 hours ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

See my post from 7.20pm on Wednesday above. 

Toyota included the following within the linked topic as regards trickle/solar chargers:

"If you have a 12V battery trickle charger, or a solar panel charger, and are confident using them, then these are a good option to keep the battery fully charged while the vehicle is stationary for a period of time."

Interesting.... I just received the Toyota email promoting the chargers this afternoon. The solar panel would be a good simple option if there's enough sunlight in the winter (in Scotland) to keep the Battery charged up as they claim. The mains trickle charger would be OK if you can keep the leads permanently attached to the Battery and just connect the charger to the leads. Accessing the Battery terminals everytime would be a faff. 

[Davidhee58]

On 2/17/2021 at 8:43 PM, Gerg said:

I rang the local Toyota dealer last week for an Auris hybrid battery price - he quoted just under £120. I'm not sure if that was fitted or to take-away. 

Just so you are aware! 

I was told by the Toyota Service Adviser if I wanted to replace the battery I had to pay £120 myself as my Battery passed the test. For Corolla Battery (45AH), £145  maybe is the right price, I guess.

 

On 2/17/2021 at 8:43 PM, Gerg said:

I rang the local Toyota dealer last week for an Auris hybrid battery price - he quoted just under £120. I'm not sure if that was fitted or to take-away. 

Just so you are aware! 

 

[john p williams]

16 minutes ago, AndrueC said:

Took my car off its trickle charger yesterday and took her for a spin around local roads. There was an odd ticking from the back that I couldn't locate but it stopped soon after I left the house. All in all she ran beautifully. I even had a chance to demonstrate to an Audi driver the difference between a 60mph zone (A43 to my estate entrance) and a 50mph zone (my estate entrance to all points west. Don't think they noticed though. They overtook and scampered off into the distance(*) at the first opportunity.

(*)Which was an HGV and they remained stuck behind that until they reached a dual carriageway eight miles further on. I got to look at the scenery. They got to stare at the **** end of an HGV.

Leave the Handbrake off when parked to avoid any ticking noise ?

[Davidhee58]

23 minutes ago, Deek said:

Interesting.... I just received the Toyota email promoting the chargers this afternoon. The solar panel would be a good simple option if there's enough sunlight in the winter (in Scotland) to keep the battery charged up as they claim. The mains trickle charger would be OK if you can keep the leads permanently attached to the battery and just connect the charger to the leads. Accessing the battery terminals everytime would be a faff. 

I bought a CTEK 5.0 recently, and I  connected the eyelet cable to Battery positive pole permanently, the negative cable is connected to cargo hook bolt, and don't need to access the Battery terminal every time. and if I want, as eyelet cable is quite small, the connector can be put outside the boot and keep the door locked.

[Gray86]

4 minutes ago, Davidhee58 said:

I bought a CTEK 5.0 recently, and I  connected the eyelet cable to battery positive pole permanently, the negative cable is connected to cargo hook bolt, and don't need to access the battery terminal every time. and if I want, as eyelet cable is quite small, the connector can be put outside the boot and keep the door locked.

You can charge it via the ‘live’ point in the fuse box under the bonnet if required too

[Davidhee58]

1 minute ago, Gray86 said:

You can charge it via the ‘live’ point in the fuse box under the bonnet if required too

Using fuse box jump start point for Battery charging is quite controversial, Toyota doesn't recommend it, but people do use it for charging without problem, don't know if there is any risk.

[Rosgoe]

16 minutes ago, Gray86 said:

You can charge it via the ‘live’ point in the fuse box under the bonnet if required too

Yes you can but make sure that the clamp on the charger is connected so that the wire that is connected to the clamp is on the contact side of the jump start/ charge terminal one side of the terminal is plastic the other side has the contact plate.

I found out when I had my auris put the + clamp on the jump start/ charge terminal but would not charge until I turned the clamp around.

[TonyHSD]

38 minutes ago, Davidhee58 said:

Using fuse box jump start point for battery charging is quite controversial, Toyota doesn't recommend it, but people do use it for charging without problem, don't know if there is any risk.

There is always a risk doing so, not that you can’t but if something goes wrong might be expensive repair. 👍