Looking for a new battery for my 70 challenger driver. Are they all about the same these days? I was looking at the restoration Turbo Start batteries. Thought they looked pretty cool. But 54lbs The red top Optima is only 38lbs. Thats 16 pounds off the front end. (still a bit of drag racer in me) What batteries are you guys happy with?

Delco in the trunk!

Red Top in the trunk. For a driver with battery in the front, I would probably go to my usual source, Walmart, and get a "better" or "best" grade battery.

Had an Optima 780cca in three cars....2 of them died prematurely. I brought one back to life using a light bulb trick....then it died a month later without a rebirth. I have a 540cca Delco and it spins the mini starter just fine., Never had a problem with it 3 years.

The Red Tops were really reliable for a while then they seem to have gotten into quality problems. Now they reportedly have a handle on it again. When my sometimes abused 8 year old Red Top showed signs of being tired this spring, I tried another. We'll see.

I've had 2 red top Optimas and they both died, Th word I hear that they are OK for a daily diver, but they don't like sitting unused for weeks at a time even with the cable disconnected I ended up with a Auto Zone Battery- no problems

Anyone use Odyssey Brand AGM?

I'm running a Odyssey motorcycle battery inside an old group 27 Mopar resto. battery. I think this is the 4th year that I have had it and so far no problems...

I put an Odyssey 1500 in the trunk of my race car a couple of years ago. I run a 50 amp alternator as required by the rules, but I charge between rounds during cooling anyway because of the electric fan and water pump. I liked it enough to buy pair of Die-Hard Platinum batteries for my 2004 Dodge diesel dually because they are manufactured by Odyssey, just relabeled - and less expensive!

I used Optima Red and Blue before with good luck, but now have the Optima as my auxilary trailer battery.

Any cross reference of links that shows the Odyssey compared to DieHard?

Being a GM sercive manager/tech, we deal in delco batterys. I can tell ya that they have really fallen off the deep end. This last winter we literally warrentied EVERY delco battery we sold. and 3 of them took 3 tries to get a decent one for the customer.

embarrassing, hell yes. Try keeping customers that way. Didnt happen. We had to give a few their money back, and havent seen them since.

The Delco rep who is a jackass came in every month and gave us grief every time till finally I took a battery, just a random battery he dropped of to us, took it over to a truck we were fixing the brakes on, and it wouldnt start the truck, just a fast click, click,click, then I tested it with our tester and his off his truck, 0cca, and 8 volts or something like that.


So from now on I tend to tell the good customer that still come in to us to let us sell them a John Deere battery. THose things are awesome.

The one in my dads van has been in there since 2004, and its still jsut as good as the day he bought it.

Used Mopar batteries for the longest time until the prices went through the roof. I am happy with the Interstate battery in my Dart for 2 years no problem. Also helps my friend carries Interstate at his shop and took a few bucks off it.

But any of the platinum will be the exact same as the Odyssey? Did you find an article or link that showed this?

Thanks
C

napa legend

Checking the specs between the same series batteries showed the same numbers weight, amps, etc. Cases are the same, just a different color. While it is possible there may be some differences, several other people on different forums observed the same thing.

Sears Platinum

Odyssey

Can't explain the listed 4 lbs difference. But I wouldn't call it a "deal breaker".

Thanks. Amazing that the same battery in basically a different color is $100 cheaper.

-C

Car quest batterys are strong. I have over charged one to the point it was boiling over before took it in the next day to get it tested and nothing was wrong with it. The car quest batterys are made by east penn and they are real good batterys i believe the napa legend batterys are also made by east penn. If i couldnt get a car quest or a napa legend then my second choice would be an excide, had good luck with excides too. Stay away from the les swchwab batterys those are junk i used to work at schwab always warrantying batterys.
I hve never had good luck with the ever starts from wal mart or the interstate batterys ether.

East Penn also makes AAA Auto Club batteries available through your AAA membership. I know this because I'm an installer. I have one in my Charger (group 34) and it does the job, 2 years going strong. Some AAA outfits use Interstate batteries I think in CA but here in NV its East Penn. Good Luck