12 volt battery life ?

[DavidM]

Has anyone replaced their. OEM LN1 AGM AC Delco battery ?

At what age ? mileage ?

Got a scare yesterday . 12v battery drained after taking a long time changing wheels and battery maintenance.

Charged 12 v and ( 15.7 v from voltmeter). car ! icon on left dash . Cleared code with a BLuetooth scanner . IT's paid for itself already.

Local Chev dealer - $335 CAN !!! for that battery and it isn't in stock - 2-4 day delivery

googled - Rock Auto - $159 US.

So prior to a long trip , I'm considering replacing the 4 yr old battery..

 

[Kermit]

Has anyone replaced their. OEM LN1 AGM AC Delco battery ?

At what age ? mileage ?

Got a scare yesterday . 12v battery drained after taking a long time changing wheels and battery maintenance.

Charged 12 v and ( 15.7 v from voltmeter). car ! icon on left dash . Cleared code with a BLuetooth scanner . IT's paid for itself already.

Local Chev dealer - $335 CAN !!! for that battery and it isn't in stock - 2-4 day delivery

googled - Rock Auto - $159 US.

So prior to a long trip , I'm considering replacing the 4 yr old battery..

Not sure I follow all of what you said. How drained was the battery? What was the voltage? How did you know it was drained? Just by the car ! icon? I assume you mean you charged it and it got up to 15.7 volts? That seems very high. The car when turned on uses the battery pack to charge the 12 volt battery at about 14.7 volts. If the battery was dead and it was charged with an AGM charger it would take 5-6 hours or more to get it charged up to that level at a 15 amp charge rate.

Others have suggested having a battery jump pack so you could get the car turned on if the battery is dead. The other option is a new battery if it worries you. I would think 5-6 years seems reasonable for an AGM battery, but weather and having the car in a garage may add to that.

 

[DavidM]

12v battery - showed 11.6 v on Volt meter. Powered car. Lots of idiot lights, couldn't move Spark. Shifted into L R and D .... nothing.

I put the Spark 12 v battery on charger for an hour in driveway last night . Started to rain . unhooked . This morning with charger on 12v . Powered up car - unhooked charger. and left Spark on for an hour. Therefore the battery pack was charging the 12 v battery.

 

[MrDRMorgan]

Here are some values I found for estimating the level of charge for a 12 volt AGM battery. Be sure to remove the negative battery cable from the post on the battery and let the battery sit for an hour or two before measuring the voltage.

AGM battery status - Open Circuit testing:

100% - 12.8 volts or higher
75% - 12.6 to 12.7 volts
50% - 12.3 to 12.5 volts
25% - 12.0 to 12.2 volts
0% - 11.8 volts
Usually, during the first week of each month, I use a BatteryMinder model 2012-AGM battery charger to charge the LN1 AGM batteries in my 2014 and 2016 Spark EVs I usually charge overnight for a minimum of 12 hours.

 

[Kermit]

I put my battery on the charger since I have not been using it for over a month and the USB dongle had discharged the battery quite a bit. It was reading 11.8volts but the car started and showed it was charging the battery at 14.7 volts from the HV battery. It took most of the day for the charger to fully charge it since the AGMs can't charge as fast.

 

[Chris101]

2014 Spark EV OEM 12V battery replaced with OEM original AGM when the car was 5 years old due to too many incidents of idiot lights and battery unable to keep charge above 12.4 consistently. New battery meant no more problems and no more fast draining down to 11.2 to 11.9

 

[MrDRMorgan]

2014 Spark EV OEM 12V battery replaced with OEM original AGM when the car was 5 years old due to too many incidents of idiot lights and battery unable to keep charge above 12.4 consistently. New battery meant no more problems and no more fast draining down to 11.2 to 11.9

Everytime I charge either my 2014 or 2016 Spark EV, the charger shows, graphically, the battery charge starting at the 50% level. When I measure the voltage across the battery with the car powered off for a few hours, I measure 12.5 volts - both cars.
Today, with my 2016 powered off and plugged into my L2 EVSE, the 12 volt battery was being charged at 13.4 volts.

I replaced the 12 volt AGM battery in my 2014 Spark EV three years ago just as a precaution. I purchased the car as a used vehicle and, at that time, many problems were being attributed to the 12 volt AGM battery. My 2016 - which I also purchased used - is still running on the original factory battery.

 

[Chris101]

Okay? You are talking about a car 2 years newer and you replaced a battery on your own as a precaution and?

I only stated a fact that in my case, the battery was OEM, 5 years old and unable to hold a proper charge. The owner before me rarely used the car and let it sit for months at a time (probably not the best for the AGM battery) and considering the super low mileage, I suspect the 1st owner let the car sit a long time too.

Battery life varies greatly depending on actual use and the fact is a Spark EV does not have an alternator so 12V battery charging simply doesn't work the same way.

 

[MrDRMorgan]

Okay? You are talking about a car 2 years newer and you replaced a battery on your own as a precaution and?

I only stated a fact that in my case, the battery was OEM, 5 years old and unable to hold a proper charge. The owner before me rarely used the car and let it sit for months at a time (probably not the best for the AGM battery) and considering the super low mileage, I suspect the 1st owner let the car sit a long time too.

Battery life varies greatly depending on actual use and the fact is a Spark EV does not have an alternator so 12V battery charging simply doesn't work the same way.

I basically was a Spark EV "newbie". I leased a 2015 Spark EV 2LT in May 2015 and followed in August 2015 by buying a used 2014 Spark EV 2LT with only 1500 miles on the ODO. It had been a Hertz rental car. On this forum, over the next year and a half, I kept seeing comments about a number of electrical problems supposedly attributed to problems with the 12 volt AGM battery. So, in November 2017 I elected to replace the 2014's 3 year-old 12 volt battery with a new one. At, the same I also bought and began using an BatteryMinder model 2012 AGM charger and I have continued a monthly program to charge the AGM battery in the 2014 and now my 2016 Spark EV 2LT which, I purchased used in October 2017. It had 6500 miles on the ODO. As of today, I have not experienced a single 12 volt electrical problem with either car. I also carry a Li-ion jump start battery in both cars as insurance.

"Boy Scout Motto" - Be Prepared!

 

[NORTON]

Okay? You are talking about a car 2 years newer and you replaced a battery on your own as a precaution and?

I only stated a fact that in my case, the battery was OEM, 5 years old and unable to hold a proper charge. ...

Battery life varies greatly depending on actual use and the fact is a Spark EV does not have an alternator so 12V battery charging simply doesn't work the same way.

My '14, at 79k miles, has the original battery.

I think Lead Acid battery life depends on a few things.
How frequently it is used and charged up, the temp it is stored at, and ,,,,
The worst for a battery is to sit for months being drained by the systems in the car that use power while the car is OFF.
There are stories of cars that sit on dealer lots for gadknows how long and when someone comes to look at it there isn't enough power to boot the car up (EV) or start the ICE.
So the chumps from the dealer 'Jump it' and they say 'All is good now', only that battery is now in bad shape, probably ruined, from sitting discharged for so long. You can't do that to a lead acid. They need 'maintenance charging' for long term storage.

So, the life of a Lead Acid battery depends on how its life has been. When you buy a used car, it's the luck of the draw.

As for a car with an alternator vs an EV with a DC to DC converter, the battery doesn't know where the topping voltage comes from.
It just sits there on the 12V bus and absorbs the current it needs to then 'float' at the typical 13.8 to 14.2 'Bus Voltage', (temp dependent).
It's a passive electrochemical thing. There isn't a battery charging system. It just happens, regardless of how the voltage is generated.

 

[ElDobro]

VW dealers have solar chargers from VW, that plug into the ALDL to keep the batteries charged in the cars, while they're sitting on the lot, or at least they're suppose to. They left one in the trunk of a TDI I bought. I keep it in the Volt when I know it's going to sit for a bit 'cause a Volt tech told me that once the traction battery is charged, the DC to DC converter no longer charges the 12V battery. I also have a Schumacher AGM charger to keep the batteries up to snuff.

 

[MMONTERO]

2016 Spark still with original AGM battery almost ending 2021!

 

[ElDobro]

I had to change the 12V because the decided to not move in D. Put in a new Delco AGM and it was like nothing happened.

 

[jsca72]

I bought my 2014 Spark in July 2013. The dashboard started doing some weird things in December 2018 like showing empty when I knew I had a full charge and then popping up to full, so I figured it was time to replace the 12 volt battery to be safe. So that was at 5 and a half years. I haven't had any odd readings since then so I'm thinking I guessed correctly.