today i went to start up the car like normal, and it started fine, but all the gauge needles went all the way over to the right like the battery had been disconnected. thig is the battery wasnt disconnected before this start up.
any ideas why the car might do this?
when your guys batteries were going bad, if you can recall. when your needles swung over to the right, was your cars hard to start or dod they start right up? mine seemed to start up pretty well, but i did hear some slight hesitation. (only about a second)
aalso the battery needle is all the way up, but this is after the car has been running. i also know the gauge battery meter in our cars are not too good.
being i have the small battery it is prolly that, but i was hopeing it would last a couple of years at least. car also has sat exactly one week before this happend. im going to unhook it and see if i charge it up maybe i can get through next summer with it.
Last year I had to replace my original battery due to its final death, and the needles never did anything like that. And I thought the volt meter in our cars measures mostly the power generated by the alternator?
my car started doing this a couple weeks ago and i have the stock battery on my 02 gt. every few starts the needles go all the way to the right and today i looked at my battery and the red dot was showing and then it went away and the green dot appeared again.
I haven't had this happen on my Mustang but FYI the same thing happens on my wife's Focus.
I believe it is a common Ford thing indicating low voltage to the cluster.
Don't despair just yet though; don't know what the temperature is like over there in NJ at the moment but I have intermittantly had this problem last two winters in the Focus and although the volts must be low to the cluster when starting it from cold it has ALWAYS fired, first time - no problems.
Symptoms disappear as soon as the temperature picks up.
Have not had to replace the battery yet. Of course, you are cranking over a much bigger motor in the Mustang.
Mine does it ever once in awhile, usually when I leave the bottle heater on in the staging lanes. Don't sweat it just toss a set of jumper cables in the trunk.
well i gave the stang a little run yesterday, and put it away for the winter. i unhooked the battery altogether, because i dont think it was going to start if i only tried to start it once a week. i wouldnt have made it.
this way i will trickle charge it over the winter, and see if it lasts me another spring, summer and fall of next year. i really wont mind having to buy another battery if i get through spring summer fall of 06. i guess then its worth another 70 bucks for the lightweight battery.
however, anyone looking to use this lightweight battery all year round i dont think is going to have much luck.