Auxiliary wiring help (Optima yellow top died on me)

[GVMotoring]

Hey everyone,

Hope all are well and staying warm! My TJ's battery died this morning and when I tried to jump it, it won't even turn over.

Context: I have an Optima Yellow top which I bought in October 2020 (so it's only 4 months old). I have my Smitty Built 10k lb winch directly wired to it, and I have a 20 inch light bar wired to a switch panel, which is sharing a fuse with my windshield wipers (tested and deemed safe) which is technically also directly wired to my battery.

I noticed that when I installed this switch panel, my battery would hesitate to cold start if I didn't run my car for more than 2 days.

It is below freezing here in Boston, so obviously that is a factor.

What I want to know is, is it expected that a winch (which I haven't been using) will drain a battery, especially an Optima Yellow top? I can post pics/video of my wiring later but this has been a challenging morning!


My YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/GVMotoring/featured

Thanks,

 

[BugoutJeep]

Please upload a video so some of us can take a look. I doubt your winch would be doing this, maybe, just maybe the wiring is weird on your switch panel. Bad batteries do happen though. I assume you've got the correct battery size?

Sounds like a bad battery or something a bit more annoying if it won't start even while jumping it.

 

[BugoutJeep]

Do you have any voltage readings of the battery?

I'm not an electrical pro by any means, but I've caused so many vehicles and pieces of equipment to not start and I've typically gotten them to run again successfully.

I do wonder about a wiring/fuse issue too. Maybe starter.

 

[Jerry Bransford]

Optima's batteries are no longer what they used to be when they earned their previously sterling reputation. Johnson Controls bought Optima and moved their entire manufacturing line to Mexico where they reduced their quality. Personally I had THREE Optima batteries die prematurely, two Yellow Tops and one Blue Top. I replaced my last Optima with one made by Odyssey and sold as a Diehard Platinum which lasted over ten years.

A winch does not draw power when it's not being used. Your battery likely died due to the cold or maybe something is drawing current when it should not?

Also be aware that a completely dead battery can pull so much power from a jump start battery that it does not have enough power to start the engine. Try disconnecting the Optima battery and connect the jump start battery directly to the battery connectors.

Also know that some jumper cables are so skinny (the gauge is too small) that they won't start a really cold or big engine.

If you have a real battery charger, not a trickle charger, try using it to charge your Optima overnight. Your Optima may recover enough to use it to get around for a short period of time but it's very likely on its last-legs and ready to die on you again.

I'd switch to a different brand of AGM battery. If you can afford an Odyssey or Northstar you'd have a great battery that will last many years. I'm now running a Northstar which is very similar to an Odyssey.

 

[Tray Burge]

Your battery has a 100% return policy, just return it and they'll give you another one for free, no pro-rating as long as you're in the term limits of the battery. I still love my Optima's even though they're made in Mexico.

 

[BugoutJeep]

x2 on the Northstar battery, though the one I had to go with won't fit unless it's on its side if you have AC.

 

[Jerry Bransford]

x2 on the Northstar battery, though the one I had to go with won't fit unless it's on its side if you have AC.

The normal Group 34 size Northstar fits fine in my TJ which has A/C.

 

[BugoutJeep]

The normal Group 34 size Northstar fits fine in my TJ which has A/C.

Yeah I have a group 27, because of additional starting needs. My only options were the group 27, a similar group 31 or dual batteries. I did use my OEM sized battery for a little over 2 years, but it was just too small and any drain of the battery, the engine would just barely start. I would have needed the group 31 if I was in the North.

 

[Vasq]

The normal Group 34 size Northstar fits fine in my TJ which has A/C.

Just a quick question since I have you here talking about batteries; would you consider interstate to be a good company or are they undesirable? I tried googling around a bit but didn't get any definitive answer as to where they're manufactured.

thanks Jerry.

EDIT: scratch that, I ended up finding more. They are made by Johnson Controls and Exide.

 

[GVMotoring]

Guys can't thank you enough for the quick responses!! I feel like a bit of a fool dropping 3x the price of a normal battery on an optima hoping it would last longer!

I'm at work right now but will test out the tips, I also have AAA so I plan on having them do a battery test for me to see if I should use my optima's warranty.

As for volt reading, the car died so hard that the electronics don't even turn on so I can't read of the gauge and don't have a multi-meter on hand

 

[BugoutJeep]

Good luck. Optima and AGMs are expensive though. At some point may lithium or graphene will start hitting a better price point.

My battery, though larger was like $400, but that's a negative to turbo diesels with relatively high compression.

 

[Jerry Bransford]

Just a quick question since I have you here talking about batteries; would you consider interstate to be a good company or are they undesirable? I tried googling around a bit but didn't get any definitive answer as to where they're manufactured.

thanks Jerry.

EDIT: scratch that, I ended up finding more. They are made by Johnson Controls and Exide.

Johnson Controls (who is now owned by another company) owns over 50% of the battery brands in the US. I don't know that Interstate and Exide AGM batteries have a bad reputation, it was Optima that Johnson Controls moved to Mexico after which their quality and reputation tanked.

 

[BugoutJeep]

I was thinking that like 15 years ago, I worked as a technician and people were saying that Optima was not the same Optima of lore. I know we changed out a bunch of batteries that were pretty new, but we changed out a massive amount of batteries that were practically new from all kinds of manufacturers, but that's hard to project anything because 1 million sold by one brand and 10 million by another brand and maybe I'm seeing 5:1 or 10:1 of some brand, but even that we'd only do maybe 2-10 batteries a day which makes everything anecdotal.

In some cases I wonder if shops were only selling maybe 50 Optimas a year and maybe only 1 was returned vs their house brand where they sold 300 or something. Maybe a few years later after telling everyone how great they are Optima is pumping out 100 from that location and seeing a few percent come back. Often production increases and either a process changes or maybe QC drops or maybe it's just that you used to see no failures and then you start seeing 2 or 3.

On top of that some batteries were just in the wrong vehicles.

 

[1515art]

I just replaced my previous odyssey battery with the slightly larger odyssey 34-1500dt and it really spins the engine on start-up, sitting for a few days or the slight compression difference in the stroker it doesn’t matter spins the motor just the same. My Jeep sat for so long in shops getting the engine swapped the battery was drained to next to nothing a couple times and it wouldn’t hold a charge for more than a day or two, the low voltage was affecting how it ran a little too it seemed anyway and the voltage drop on start-up was triggering a pending generic transmission DTC.

 

[Jerry Bransford]

I was thinking that like 15 years ago, I worked as a technician and people were saying that Optima was not the same Optima of lore. I know we changed out a bunch of batteries that were pretty new, but we changed out a massive amount of batteries that were practically new from all kinds of manufacturers, but that's hard to project anything because 1 million sold by one brand and 10 million by another brand and maybe I'm seeing 5:1 or 10:1 of some brand, but even that we'd only do maybe 2-10 batteries a day which makes everything anecdotal.

In some cases I wonder if shops were only selling maybe 50 Optimas a year and maybe only 1 was returned vs their house brand where they sold 300 or something. Maybe a few years later after telling everyone how great they are Optima is pumping out 100 from that location and seeing a few percent come back. Often production increases and either a process changes or maybe QC drops or maybe it's just that you used to see no failures and then you start seeing 2 or 3.

On top of that some batteries were just in the wrong vehicles.

A major Optima distributor confirmed to me that the biggest reason Optima's quality nose-dived was they stopped using pure lead after the move to Mexico. It got so bad that Costco completely stopped selling Optimas due to all the returns they had. At one point Costco was Optima's largest retailer.

 

[BugoutJeep]

A major Optima distributor confirmed to me that the biggest reason Optima's quality nose-dived was they stopped using pure lead after the move to Mexico. It got so bad that Costco completely stopped selling Optimas due to all the returns they had. At one point Costco was Optima's largest retailer.

Yeah that should do it. Chemistry and batteries are a big deal. Hopefully I'll have good look with Northstar and Odysee. I've only had Northstar for a few months, but we've been pretty cold around here and I haven't started up my Jeep for a month while rebuilding my suspension and steering and axles and though my voltage was a bit low, the Jeep did fire up for me to turn it around to start on the rear.

 

[GVMotoring]

Welp its working now! The AAA employee had a jumper box w/ a multimeter which read a good battery. All I did was slightly move around the terminals and it started with no jump... hmmmm...

Terminals are TIGHT, I wonder if there is something with the wiring of the terminals?

 

[Tray Burge]

I certainly believe you Jerry, but I'm on my 3rd Optima and have never had any problems with mine.
In fact, I just replaced the one in my truck and it was 2 years over the batteries life?
I'm sure they may have suffered from the move, but as long as they keep that warranty in place and I continue to get great service out of one I'm staying. I don't think anybody has a fool proof product that will never fail early?
Besides, I also have the Optima billet battery holder in my truck that is just too cool to get rid of. lol

 

[Wildman]

@Tray Burge I use to be a firm Optima user also. I had 2 yellow tops in my TJ and had the first one fail just months past the 2 year warranty. So another $200+ for a new one. Then the second one died also and I replaced it with the hopes that I'd just happened to get a bad bunch of batteries. But both the 2 new ones failed in a SHORT time later also. So I am done with them and will be using Odyssey batteries when I put batteries in the TJ this time around.

 

[BugoutJeep]

Welp its working now! The AAA employee had a jumper box w/ a multimeter which read a good battery. All I did was slightly move around the terminals and it started with no jump... hmmmm...

Terminals are TIGHT, I wonder if there is something with the wiring of the terminals?

I didn't get a great view of your terminals since I only saw the video on my phone. However wiggling the terminals and a bad connection is something that happens.