Your experiences with Optima/Odyssey/AGM lifespans?

What are your good or bad experiences with
non-conventional lead acid battery designs,
particularly in
useable lifespan of the battery
versus buying price?

The spiral internals of the Optima look interesting,
but some reviewers report that they fail soon after the 2 year warranty is up?

the classic case AGM battery in my 72 roadrunner lasted 15 years before it wouldn't hold a charge properly.
never used a battery tender on it. stored it inside my house during winter storage. springtime i gave it a charge, with a charger designed for AGM battery, before installing it.

My original Optima was an awesome piece that lasted 12 years.

The Optima in my truck is 5 or more years old and I'm starting to question its reliability. The truck is rarely driven but has been turning a tiny bit slower when I try to start it.

I, too, have heard some bad rumblings about recent production batteries not lasting that long. The rumor is that they offshored production and used recycled materials that aren't up to snuff.

I can't confirm that.


I can tell you that 3 years is the average service life out of a car battery in north Texas.

I had a red top Optima for 10 plus years until my charging system recently started to overcharge and ruined it. Honestly the car sat for long periods and I never really kept it charged like I should have but it still ran strong. I replaced it with another rep top. So far so good.

My experience has been they last a long time. Last one I killed lasted 13 years. I have also learned I don't car for them in a race car that requires charging. The reserve capacity isn't great enough. They don't regain a lot of capacity unless slow charged. Therefore if you run a small alternator and big power draw they didn't like to go more than a few days of racing with out a slow charge. That made 3 day and some 2 day events tough unless you could plug in the charger or run the generator over night.
Doug

one thing to remember about AGM battery is proper charging.
a regular battery charger won't charge them without a special process.
you ether attach a good battery to the AGM one with good jumper cables. then hook the charger to it or use a charger designed for them.
special AGM chargers have dropped in the last few years. getting the proper one is reccomended.

also if you have a low battery in your car the alternator might not charge it properly.

I've had Optima yellow and red tops all work great for years. I was completely satisfied with paying a little higher price for them.

Any experiences with the Blue Top Optimas?

I had those in my boat as well, lasted all the 8 years that I owned it. It was a v-drive that got very little use.
[img]https://scontent-dft4-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t...amp;oe=588B1D1F[/img]

I got almost 10 years out of one, 7 so far on another.
I usually get 5-7 years out of any battery - except ones I bought from WalMart, those either leaked or died within a year - as I put trickle chargers on them, but I use the Optimas for cars where I want no chance of any damage from terminal corrosion or acid.
Schumacher has a trickle charger that also works on AGM, and I saw the other day that Duralast (AutoZone) also sells one. Usually around $28.

I still have the very first AGM battery I purchased - it's now 16 years old! I've also installed a few Die Hard Platinum (Odyssey?) batteries in family members cars. I'm bummed that Sears quit selling the Die Hard Platinum. AGM batteries do require a special charger.

I got 13 months out of mine purchased in 2012.

Im on my second one of these beauties after 10 years...

12 years on a red top Optima. I let it go with the truck when I traded it in,and so far the new owner still is using it.

Anyone have experience with the Exide built AGM batteries?

Notice their graphs

http://www.exide.com/Media/files/Downloads/TransAmer/Products/Edge6pgMKTG27830_8-14.pdf

The local Rural King store stocks these

I have the same lightweight (26 pounds) battery on my 11.5 to 1 451 since 8 years...

EVery time I had a problem battery it was an Exide...

I've been looking at one of those for the Imperial.

It just so happens that we replaced one at work. I saw it in the core pile and the date on the battery was March 2016. I pulled it and took it home. If I can get it to take a charge I'll bring my old battery in as a core.

It had 11.7 volts on it when I put the intelligent charger on it last night. The battery went up to 13.1 volts before I took it off the charger and was at 13.0 when I left this morning.
I'll check it when I get home to see if it's still holding 13 volts.

Worse one was a brand new battery in my freshly restored 77 stepside.. I kept on having voltage and low battery problems and the battery checked out good every time..

The Battery sales guy finally pulled the battery and checked each cell with a "float"? tester.. Had a bad cell...

I'm waiting for my new adopted AGM battery to stabilize at 12.5 volts without a load on it. It's still a bit high at 12.9 volts.

So far, I think it's a good battery. I'll let it sit until Saturday when I can drop it in the truck and chase down the draw that is killing the current battery.

I hope you can reclaim it.

Here is a do it yourself desulfator project if a conventional charger is not enough.

http://www.alton-moore.net/graphics/desulfator.pdf

The author says it can take a month to break up the large sulfate crystals

Sample quote


Usage
It should be emphasized that pulsing energy to and from the battery happens at less than 100 percent efficiency. This circuit draws about 40 mA from the battery while in operation (less than 1 amp-hour per day), so some additional charging source is needed. For reconditioning a sulfated battery, I simply clip the circuit across the battery terminals in parallel with a 30 watt solar panel.
In my initial testing, it took a month to partially reclaim a pair of golf cart batteries that had been allowed to sit, discharged, for almost a year. They had such a high internal resistance that a very small current would take the terminal voltage over 16 volts.
For use in a functioning power system, you can clip the circuit across the main battery terminals, using as short a lead length as possible. When external equipment, such as an inverter, is connected across a battery bank, then additional low impedance paths are formed. The desulfator’s current pulses will happily flow down these paths as well, and it serves no purpose for the pulses to flow into the inverter.
End quote

The cranking blue top is the same as a red top, the deep cycle blue top is the same as a yellow top. The only differences being the marine terminal style and warranty.

It turns out that my Optima is, indeed, dead.
My charger says there is an internal short and I'm fairly sure that's what was causing my electrical issue.

The date on the side of the battery is December 2006. I can't complain. That thing doesn't owe me anything after 10 years.

I had one last 11 years. Same thing, can't complain.

My smart charger has a desulfate program built into it. The unit draws the battery down, pulses a charge backwards through the battery to clear the plates, then bring it back up to full charge. The process takes at least 24 hours to complete.

My Yellow top lasted 3 years. I killed it by letting it discharge too far. I tried the parallel charging trick and it would come up to voltage, but it would die soon afterward. Standard lead/acid batteries seem to tolerate neglect better.

My truck will sometimes sit for a few weeks without being started. The Optima lasted 10 years with that kind of use.

I had a brake light switch that would hang closed and kill the battery. I don't know if that did it in or not.

I replaced the switch last week but the damage may have already been done.