How Badly Did I Screw Up Here?

[AbleGuy]

OK, full disclosure, I was just being lazy and tired of dealing with stupid BS… So several weeks ago when I went to check on my F350 tiger in Storage, I saw the starting battery was dead again and decided to put off dealing with this for a while.

This seems to happen every time I leave it in storage for a month or so.

Anyway, I took the battery out of the truck and took it home and put it on a NOBO charger to recharge it. After it was recharged, I put it on the “restore“ function and left it plugged in for another 48 hours.

Then I took the battery back to the storage yard and decided to not re-install it since I was not going to be using it for for weeks, and instead just left the battery inside the cab on the floor.

Now I read that with more modern rigs, if you leave the battery disconnected for a while it screws up all the electronics… things like your electric windows don’t work anymore!

So I’m wondering…when I put the battery back into the truck in a week or so, are things really going to be that messed up, or will start right back up and everything will be fine?

My question to the rest of you is whether this alleged problem of letting the battery go dead is really a thing, or if it’s not something I need to worry about with a 2011 pickup truck.

Any comments based on experience, opinions, or “I don’t know cause I’ve never had this problem, but here’s what I think…” responses will be greatly appreciated!

Thanks y’all.

 

[Mickey Bitsko]

First and foremost, load test the battery and remove all doubt
Of a weak or need a new battery time.

 

[AbleGuy]

So….Assuming a battery has, and can hold, a full charge, does it create problems to your electrical system once you’ve re-installed that battery after leaving your rig battery less for a couple of months? I did that on purpose to avoid theft while it was in storage.

 

[2025 deleted member]

One easy way to find out?. This sounds like the whole year 2000 deal when computers were going to shut the world down… all the anticipation… and nothing happened.?

 

[Mickey Bitsko]

So….Assuming a battery has, and can hold, a full charge, does it create problems to your electrical system once you’ve re-installed that battery after leaving your rig battery less for a couple of months? I did that on purpose to avoid theft while it was in storage.

Just because it can hold a charge does not mean it will have sustained
cranking power, first indication ofa weak or dying battery is its abilityto sustain cranking amps..
Advance auto or a good parts house can test for you.
Just make sure you have it fully charged.

 

[mep1811]

Why not just leave the batteries on a trickle charger and alleviate the issue?

 

[Mickey Bitsko]

Is it possible over the winter the battery froze when it was dead?
If so, the battery has been jeopardized.
Good luck ?

 

[john61ct]

A small solar panel is plenty to keep a Starter batt topped up, even in cloudy weather, in the shade maybe 40W

unless you have shore power available, then a small AC-DC "maintainer"

 

[AbleGuy]

Thx guys

Since it’ll be a while before I go back to try starting this (I’ve no plans for travel with the tiger for a while, hi gas $$$ and all), it’ll be a while before I find out if I screwed anything up.

Since I just read on another forum about a guy who’s electric windows and speedo would not work correctly after he let his rig set for a while with a dead battery, it got me wondering…you know?

So I basically was curious if anyone here had experienced similar weirdness…as PJ said above, there’s one way to find out!

 

[Mickey Bitsko]

Maybe I should come up and take the tiger off your hands and maintain it for you....

 

[Superduty]

I think you will be fine.

 

[Martinjmpr]

Since I just read on another forum about a guy who’s electric windows and speedo would not work correctly after he let his rig set for a while with a dead battery, it got me wondering…you know?

So I basically was curious if anyone here had experienced similar weirdness…as PJ said above, there’s one way to find out!

When I lived in the South I picked up a lot of slang and idioms. One of my favorites is "don't borrow trouble."

Don't worry about what happened to some other dude with some other rig. Hook up the battery and see what works and what doesn't, and then go from there.

Also seconding those who say get a trickle charger to keep the battery healthy.

 

[deserteagle56]

Also seconding those who say get a trickle charger to keep the battery healthy.

Maybe just a matter of semantics - but no, DO NOT connect a trickle charger and leave it on there. A trickle charger will eventually kill your battery as it charges constantly whether the battery needs charging or not. You need a battery MAINTAINER - something that will monitor the battery and apply a charge only when a charge is needed.

Something like this. There are many more examples.

https://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200332201_200332201

 

[john61ct]

"trickle charger" denotes the super crappy old school garage chargers without charge regulation or even termination.

low amps is fine for trickling

Maintainer with 3-stage intelligence is what you want.

Optimate Tecmate is an example

But a high-amp charger is fine too, so long as it is smart, ideally programmable

 

[jadmt]

when you hook the battery back up it may take a day or two for things to come back to normal but things will be fine.