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Post by Roadrunner on Jan 18, 2023 19:33:18 GMT
The Benz battery finally gave up in the -5 frost yesterday morning. AA came out today, fitted a replacement and tested everything for £277. Less than half the price the main stealers wanted for the same job.
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Post by PetrolEd on Jan 18, 2023 20:50:26 GMT
What, have I been living under a stone? £500 for a battery? I thought £277 seemed a lot.
I’ll have to do the Porsches at some point as it’s a little lazy to start in this weather but usually I put the ctek onto the car in recondition mode and it does the trick.
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Post by Tim on Jan 19, 2023 8:40:07 GMT
I got quoted £370 by the dealer about 5 years ago for our, then 4 year old, 320d.
Part of the cost is that it's an AGM battery for stop-start and needs to be coded to the car.
I stopped using stop-start and the battery was still in the car and performing well when I sold it 50k miles later.
By contrast the massive battery for the M5 is £150 from Halfrauds and just drops straight in. That's the joy of older cars.
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Post by Boxer6 on Jan 19, 2023 13:04:17 GMT
The Benz battery finally gave up in the -5 frost yesterday morning. AA came out today, fitted a replacement and tested everything for £277. Less than half the price the main stealers wanted for the same job. That doesn't bode well for the Optimist's battery then! Having said that, it was -6 rising to -3C this morning, and it started firs time - as it has all week. Perhaps it was the -8/9C temps we had that caused it to have a problem and even a little less cold is OK. I'll still get it replaced fairly soon though (payday) I think, and Halfraud's only want £100 for their version of the stop-start for mine. |
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Post by PG on Jan 19, 2023 14:09:12 GMT
The Benz battery finally gave up in the -5 frost yesterday morning. AA came out today, fitted a replacement and tested everything for £277. Less than half the price the main stealers wanted for the same job.Ye gods. Is the battery filled with the tears of angels? |
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Post by Roadrunner on Jan 19, 2023 16:31:01 GMT
The Benz battery finally gave up in the -5 frost yesterday morning. AA came out today, fitted a replacement and tested everything for £277. Less than half the price the main stealers wanted for the same job.Ye gods. Is the battery filled with the tears of angels? Benz main dealer service and repair prices have gone absolutely crazy recently. They wanted to change £750 for a service and MOT, so it is going to a well-reccomended independent specialist in Cheltenham next week. I have added a transmission flush and filter replacement to the job and it is still going to be about £200 cheaper. |
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jan 21, 2023 19:47:59 GMT
It’s eye-watering how much main dealer servicing prices have gone up in the last 10 years yet the salary they pay their techs has barely moved.
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Post by racingteatray on Jan 21, 2023 20:57:42 GMT
What, have I been living under a stone? £500 for a battery? I thought £277 seemed a lot. I’ll have to do the Porsches at some point as it’s a little lazy to start in this weather but usually I put the ctek onto the car in recondition mode and it does the trick. Yes you have a bit because I posted about a similar shock when I enquired about a new battery from BMW for the 440i and it was in the £450-500 range! |
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Post by Big Blue on Jan 23, 2023 19:45:36 GMT
Our Mini needs a new battery methinks. It has had a couple of charges this winter when previously none have been required. It’s due an annual service in March so it’ll be done then.
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Post by Grampa on Jan 27, 2023 11:59:19 GMT
Wow - had to have a new battery in the Mini and in the Elgrand recently - both were just over the £100 mark and the battery place apologised for the spec making them so expensive (Mini has stop-start, Elgrand has lots of electric FG)
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Post by alf on Feb 1, 2023 12:06:43 GMT
The XFR had to have both the batteries replaced recently - it has a separate start/stop one.
I also had all the brakes done, there was technically plenty of pad/disc left but the (original - at 70k miles) front discs were lipped and it made a racket turning. So pads and discs all round.
All using OEM parts, but through a local garage who passed on the big parts discout he gets from Jaguar. £1700. Ouchy!
It is lovely now though, the stop start had been messing about for ages, and the brakes worked fine but were making more and more noise turning hard right. I even asked the guy to check all the wishbones and replace anything that had play, but they were all fine which is good at that mileage. Bar tyres its never cost me aything except (suprisingly OK) servicing so far, nearly 5 years in, so I can't grumble.
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Post by racingteatray on Feb 1, 2023 21:48:42 GMT
Sounds good. I expect the 440i will need a new battery before too long, as it was on its original after six years and 50k miles, and had a grumble in October after sitting unused in the garage in Italy for 7 weeks, and then grumbled again in Jan when I got back to London after three and a half weeks away. It started both times but was unhappy about it.
That said the battery on Mrs RT’s Fiat is in its tenth year and it has never grumbled to date despite similar periods of disuse to the BMW and being a car that has only done slightly under 22k miles in all that time, mostly bimbling around central London.
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Post by racingteatray on Apr 7, 2023 23:38:52 GMT
Started up the Mini this morning for the first time in nearly three months and it started on the button without the slightest grumble. Then again it is still fairly box-fresh and has been tucked away in a nice warm underground garage.
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Post by ChrisM on Dec 16, 2023 20:57:47 GMT
The battery in the Fiesta was dead when I came back from Germany; not enough power to activate the starter (push-button). This morning I tried with my little lithium booster thing and the same result. I was pleasantly surprised when the RAC turned up after only about 30 minutes and although the car then started with booster cables, I decided that as it was at only 7V initially and the electrics weren't fully functional after it was first stared, it was probably time for a new battery. Interestingly I wasn't pressured to buy a new battery from them and although it was a little steep (over £200), it was done there and then saving me the time and hassle of finding one in stock somewhere locally and either getting it fitted or me fitting it then having to dispose of the dead one. It was the original battery, dating from autumn 2015 when the car was built, so almost 8 1/2 years which these days doesn't seem so bad.
Start-stop is now working too, first time in quite a few years
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Post by Alex on Dec 17, 2023 9:14:19 GMT
The wifes Panda had the battery go whilst she was in Tesco a year or so ago and I think the RAC only charged about £100 for a new one fitted. As the cheapest I could find from a quick Google search of local motor factors was about 80 quid we just went with it to save the hassle.
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Post by Tim on Jan 3, 2024 9:36:11 GMT
While we were away one of the neighbours parked his 2010 Yaris on our drive (at our request...) and started it up a couple of times but didn't actually go anywhere.
The battery is now flat and yesterday wouldn't take a charge.
Its done pretty well for being the original battery in a car that now does about 2k miles a year.
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Post by racingteatray on Jan 8, 2024 16:48:08 GMT
Just got back to London last night after being away for three weeks, and it was very heartening to find that the Fiat started first time this morning with nary a suggestion of a complaint, despite the battery now being into its 11th year. And given that the poor car suffered the indignity of having a large trellis (and attached rambling rose) fall on it after Storm Gerrit succeeded in detaching it from the front wall of the house while we were away (thankfully causing no immediately obvious damage), it could have been forgiven a grumble.
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Post by Tim on Jan 9, 2024 8:40:21 GMT
That's a good result.
When we got back after 2 weeks away I started the KIA but only ran it for a couple of minutes. TBH I was surprised it did start due to the cold and my suspicions that the battery isn't healthy.
When I went to start it on Sunday it struggled, almost started but then ran out of charge. Jumping it from the BMW saw it leap straight into life though.
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Post by rodge on Apr 8, 2024 12:12:45 GMT
Went to bed early last night as I felt I was coming down with flu.
Didn’t sleep much, felt miserable this morning and emailed work to say I wouldn’t be in.
Then Mrs. R went out to the car and hers had no power at all.
I told her to take mine and then looked up replacements and they had them in Halfords.
Her battery was reading 3.9v when I checked so I removed it and we went to get the replacement.
Got it sorted and no codes needed thankfully.
I’m now lying on the couch watching Oppenheimer.
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