battery died, worst 4 hour ride ever, now radio wont work

[DesertBen44]

Wondering if anyone can shed light on this pain in the ass weekend I have had.

Flew back into denver saturday morning. truck wont start. Looks like I left the headlights on. great.

2 airport clowns in ford rangers pulled up and tried to help me jumpstart it. would crank crazy slow, no luck (completely discharged group31s, maybe they need to be deep cycled? idk)

call AAA> guy shows up in a f350 and hooks cables up. slow crank. he revs the 350, and my truck fired up instantly

drive halfway home, stop in FRISCO, CO. (out of gas, was hoping batteries would have some sort of charge in them by then)

against the law in CO to fuel with truck running, shut it down. wouldnt even crank on batteries.

called AAA again. (never paid my dues so this is all cash flying out of my pocket haha)

guy shows up in big flatbed with a dt466. fails to jumpstart truck. says its cranking normal speed and its a problem with truck (was cranking WAYYYY too slow)

second guy shows up. Both dt466 rigs were hooked up to my truck. still fails to crank fast. both there jumper cables were corroded pieces of s***

So finally we roll started it and I drove home. When I got home in junction, put 2 new batteries in it (no more group 31s at retail for me thats for sure, think I found a weakness)

Truck starts fine now on the new group 65s i think, whatever it came with. But the radio, which was working driving out of denver after the jumpstart and died somewhere on the way home, is now dead.

no fuses are blown in cab

no fuses are blown under hood

is there a fuse at the radio itself I might have blown? find it hard to believe it wouldnt blow the factory fuses first. any other ideas what could be wrong with it? its nothin fancy, just a aftermarket pioneer deck.

and a side note, is this a weakness to group 31s? if they are FULLY discharged (aka headlights on for a week) is there no jumping life into them? very possible that these guys in frisco were clowns though, the connection at the towtruck had so much white powder looked like they had a drug habit.

 

[chris142]

There is a trick to charging a completly dead battery such as yours. Hook the dead one up to a known good battery then put a battery charger on the both of them for an hr or so.leave the charger charging but remove the jumper cables from the good battery.now let the dead battery charge as long as needed. Remember charge amps divided into amhr capacity. A 100 amhr battery would need 50 hours @ 2amps to fully charge. What happens is that a dead battery has no resistance so the alternator or charger can't "see"it so it wont charge it.

 

[chris142]

Here is how to charge them from optima. Works with agm and wet cells. If it still wont take a charge the battery is bad.
http://www.optimabatteries.com/us/en/support/faqs/

 

[DesertBen44]

hey thanks chris! that process looks simple enough! good thing I didnt give up the 31s as cores haha, figured I would eat the 10 dollar charges in hopes that they can be recovered.

These look like the batteries I had, got them out of a truck I parted out but damn there expensive!
http://www.sears.com/diehard-platinum-marine-battery-group-size-31m-price/p-02850131000P

 

[heff]

there should be a 5amp fuse on the stereo. it will be on the back, usually beside the connector.

 

[DesertBen44]

Right on, that has to be the culprit. If it stops raining Ill go check it tonight, thanks for the info! thought i remembered seeing one there but wasnt sure. Do you know if its a special fuse you need to order? or something common

 

[DesertBen44]

On the bright side, the fact taht the truck could be driven with no batteries at all is really cool. At some parts of the drive the speedo and odo werent even on. headlights, wipers barely worked. might have been a little tougher in something newer!

 

[HS108]

Most aftermarket radios have fuses built into the back of them.

It should be a plain old blade style fuse

 

[heff]

no special fuse needed, should be the bigger blade fuse, i think it's the same size as what's in the fuse block in your truck. biggest thing will be tracking down the little tool to remove the stereo. unless you were smart and put yours somewhere safe and easy to find.

 

[79jasper]

I've used knifes to remove my radios in the past...

 

[chris142]

A bent coat hanger works too

 

[chris142]

hey thanks chris! that process looks simple enough! good thing I didnt give up the 31s as cores haha, figured I would eat the 10 dollar charges in hopes that they can be recovered.

These look like the batteries I had, got them out of a truck I parted out but damn there expensive!
http://www.sears.com/diehard-platinum-marine-battery-group-size-31m-price/p-02850131000P

The reserve capacity on those batts is huge. will take 34 hrs to recharge with a typical 6a charger.

People do not realize the amount of time it takes to recharge a dead battery. A few trips around the block wont do.

 

[DesertBen44]

so fuse on back of radio fixed it, thanks for replies! Wont be able to try deep cycling the batteries til this weekend, I assume hooking up the good batt in parrellell will make all the difference

after 12 hours on my charger on the slow charge it shut off and thought it was good.

 

[Greg5OH]

1150 CCA!
damn...sure beats my 900 anyday! i bet your engine spun over real quick when they were good.
my batteries are good for at least another 4 years, but some top grade high CCA batteries are on the to do list for sure.
If my batteries are still good, ill stick em in a battery tray under the cab with a battery isolator.