Rep Power: 0

Hi guys. i have this optima yellow top in my civic. i was playing with my multimeter, and checked the battery volts since sometimes i have problem with the car running out of battery.

optima yellow top it is the D51 model.

well this were my reading.
12.19V ENGINE OFF
12.75V ENGINE RUNNING
12.51V ENGINE RUNNING AND HEADLIGHTS ON.
12.09V ENGINE RUNNING, HEADLIGHST ON AND THE HEATER AT HIGH.


and the stereo was on but it wasn't playing anything since the ipod wasn't connected. also i have two amps. one alpine mrp-m500 and a rockford p400.4 which were ON but again, my stereo wasn't playing anything.

well the thing is that i know that 12.19V is low but i don't know since it is an optima battery should it be reading as it were a normal battery?

and also if yes. if those number are too low is it just the battery? or could it be the alternator as well?.

hope some can answer and help.

 
Rep Power: 192

That is low for a charged battery.

Plus you might want to check this out.

https://www.civicforums.com/forums/1...ttery-faq.html

 
Rep Power: 236

I'm thinking draining the battery so much has hurt it.

You also may want to think about a higher output alternator.

 
Rep Power: 813

also optimas are junk. especially the group51 yellow which optima later admitted was a complete fail on their part and stopped making them because of defects that could not be fixed. mine did not even last 2 yrs before it wouldnt start the car or take a charge. left me stranded. never again. and yeah mine read low voltage all the time. by the end it never went above 12v even with lots of highway driving. and i had one small speaker amp and hardly ever turned the volume up. i stick with proven flooded lead-acid technology now. i went with a honda interstate battery last time and months later its still juiced up at 12.6-12.8v in the summer. very good battery and made a huge difference in how the car starts and drives (ELD kicks in way more often to turn the alt off when cruising).

 
Rep Power: 0

i did another "test"
11.85V ENGINE RUNNING, HEADLIGHTS&FOG LIGHTS ON, HEATER ON, BACK WINDOW DEFROST ON and the stereo still on(including the amps) but wasnt playing anything again.

so at the end. it is the battery the one is causing me the problems? should i go for a different battery? i've had with the battery like 1 1/2 year. something like that.

also i live in Tucson, AZ. where the weather is hot i don't know if that affect too.

 
Rep Power: 813

yeah the weather affects any battery, hotter the battery gets the faster it fails. but any normal battery getting less than 5 yrs of life is usually unheard of. you can also get a bigger battery than the stock size, with a higher CCA rating, to help with your system. by your last specs, id say the optima is pretty much done and wont be able to start the car any day now. i would also get a free alternator check at the auto store just to be sure its putting out the normal 70 amps.

 
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all right thanks for your answers.
oh! almost forgot, also i had a problem 3 weeks ago i guess, i was driving my car at night, with my A/C on and the stereo On but i wasn't playing anything loud. then the lights dimmed and the lights started to get every second less bright at the point that the engine went off. the car wouldn't start again, minutes later a friend came and we had to jump start the battery. and the engine ran again.

the fact that the car engine went off while driving made me thing that it was the alternator. but after that it didn't happen again, but i see dimming when playing "loud".

 
Rep Power: 257

get a Duralast yellow top from Autozone they are the best for the price since they are made by the same manufacturer that also makes Diehard (Sears), Interstate, Kirkland (Costco), Motorcraft (Ford), and some EverStarts.

 
Rep Power: 0

Might suggest putting the amps on a separate battery.

 
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do you think i should? i mean as far as i know i don't need that for the small amps i have. or why are you suggesting that?

 
Rep Power: 236

^^ If you do get another battery are you gonna hook it to the alternator or is it gonna stand-alone? Hooking it to the alt is kind of a pain and a stand-alone needs constant charging. Just get a higher output alt but, get a new battery first.

 
Rep Power: 813

and it needs to be a sealed batt if you plan to install inside the car.

 
Rep Power: 236

^^ Awww, come on. Everybody likes an acid bath every once in a while. lol

 
Rep Power: 257

or suffocating from poisonous gases just get a larger Duralast yellow and you'll be fine.

 
Rep Power: 0

Hi DeskO,
Optima YellowTops are considered fully-charged if their voltage reads between about 13.0-13.2 volts. The output of your alternator should be about 13.7-14.7 volts, but if it never gets above 12.75, it will never fully-charge your battery.
Here is a link that can help with those numbers and proper charging of discharged Optimas.
Now, one variable could be a big stereo if you have one in your car. However, looking at the numbers you list, especially the 12.5 volts with just the headlights on, I suspect your alternator or charging system is getting weak somewhere. When your lights dim, that means the car is using more electricity than the alternator can provide at that moment and the battery is being discharged to cover the difference. If your battery gets discharged to the point where you need a jump start, it is a good idea to fully-charge the battery with a battery charger as soon as possible. Most alternators are designed to maintain batteries, not recharge deeply-discharged batteries. When that happens, a cycle of dead batteries and jump-starts usually follows, until either the battery or alternator fails. I suggest taking the car to a professional and let them check your charging system.

gearbox, we still manufacture Group 51 YellowTops and have not had any issues with the quality of those batteries. It is always troublesome to see things like that posted online, so if you could provide a link to the source of your information regarding our products, I'd like to address it there directly as well. I hope this helps, and feel free to ask any question you may have about our products.
Thanks,
Bill Howell
eCare Manager, OPTIMA Batteries, Inc.
www.powerpacknation.com

 
Rep Power: 257

uhh oww optima bill is pisst he gonna sue yo azz.

 
Rep Power: 813

i had a bad experience with my grp51 yellowtop barely lasting 2 yrs before it would not hold a charge or start the car, and the alternator was tested fine when replacing the battery. I have been using regular lead-acid ever since and never had the problem of low voltage that the optima did. the regular grp51 always stays right at 12.6v all the time. the optima would almost never read above 12v even after 30 mins of freeway driving. i hardly used the radio and had no major power draw items. i hate using the a/c so that stayed off too. and i am very aware of how to properly take care of batteries so this was not a user issue.

after being disappointed i went online and searched yahoo and google for optima problems and found endless posts from others on all sorts of different car forums. not only specifically about the grp51 yellowtops failing in 2 yrs, but also about other optimas in general. i am surprised you have not heard about any of this, as a quick internet search will bring up dozens of threads on many forums. i used to have a very high opinion of optimas and decided to try it out, but simply did not live up to my expectations. here are just a few samples of different forums and their concerns. i think the main problem is the yellowtop is not suited for a standard vehicle that only needs a starting battery. if you really do work for optima, i hope you can address all these issues and get your reputation back. hondatech is the main forum where ive heard them talk about the g51 yellowtops being defective and no longer being produced (as told by an optima rep). oh i also used to work for advance auto parts on the east coast and the optimas were our number one return item under warranty. we hated selling them because they would always come back in a year or two and we would lose our sale stats due to giving a refund. the generic autocraft silvers we sold to everyone, our cheapest battery, lasted an average of 6 yrs (usually abused or they forgot to add distilled water and the cells got exposed to air). i had one guy bring in a bad silver battery from 10 yrs ago!

http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f12/o...issue-1062543/

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsc...use-print.html

http://honda-tech.com/showthread.php?t=973256

http://honda-tech.com/showthread.php?t=1588217

another forum that says the 51 is gone due to quality concerns

http://www.rx7club.com/showthread.php?t=533207

http://www.rx7club.com/showthread.php?t=566701

well i could search all night but that should get you started.

 
Rep Power: 0

I have a yellow top battery and it has served me well so far. About a year of service with no problems. I'm running a multiple amp, 4 speaker, and a sub with a stock alt. No dimming of the lights but I plan on getting a DC Electric high output alternater. Try checking your charging system, maybe your alt. is going. Battery is used only to start your car.

 
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Duralast Gold Top is awesome. That battery eliminated all my problems I only wish I could have taken it out of my 7th gen when it got totaled.

P.S you will usually start having immobilizer issues and when/if you do, your battery is likely a goner by then. I know because I thought I could get away with it but ended with a dead battery in my university campus parking lot in 99 degree heat in the spring.

 
Rep Power: 292

I'm currently running AC Delco,
No problems with it as of yet
I abuse my system on a daily basis

 
Rep Power: 0

Gearbox,
First, let me apologize for taking this long to reply. It took me two weeks and several conversations with top management to get to the bottom of the Group 51 issue as mentioned below.
I do represent Optima on the forums and yes, this is my job to find threads where people have or are having issues with our batteries and see if we can work through them.
When your YellowTop went bad, did you replace it? Exercise your warranty? What was the final result on it? We hate to hear when someone has unresolved battery issues and try to see what we can do to fix them.
Since releasing our new Prius battery, we have heard quite a bit of feedback from the Toyota community, that also indicated folks thought our Group 51 batteries were discontinued for some reason or another. We've looked into this and even spoken with our Director of Product Development and Marketing about it and it appears as if there was some confusion regarding our Group 51 batteries. Some of this confusion may have been complicated by feedback provided by folks who used to handle Optima's customer service inquiries and as best we can determine, there may have been some confusion relating to the discontinued use of orange tops for our reverse terminal batteries. We still manufacture both D51 and D51R in YellowTops and Group 34 and 34R batteries in our RedTops and from what I have been told, we have never ceased production on any of those battery groups.

While we do come across many conversations relating to our batteries (both good and bad), this volume is a reflection of the volume of batteries we sell and the fact that we are the most-widely available replacement battery in the world. While I understand the frustration you experienced with returns at the retail level, I hope you can understand the frustration we experience at the manufacturing level, when we test warranty returns and find that most are just deeply-discharged and work fine, when properly-recharged. Several of our employees get to work each day in vehicles started by some of these “dead” Optimas that were returned under warranty. We are working to address this issue with both online training and an Optima University program that travels the country and the response so far has been very positive. We also created this YouTube video, to help show everyone how to recover deeply-discharged batteries

YellowTops are dual-purpose batteries, and are designed to be both a cranking battery and a deep-cycle battery for stereo systems, winching, etc. Our RedTops are SLI (starting/lighting/ignition) batteries for cranking only and are not designed for will not work well in applications where people use them with big stereo systems. Either will work fine for starting and maintaining your OEM electrical system as long as the charging system is working properly.
I do understand that like every battery manufacturer, we do have some batteries go bad. However, when we can get to the bottom of the stories we do often find different reasons why they failed, not all due to the product itself. We do have a great warranty on all our batteries and strive to make sure we only get better.

Again, if I can answer any other question about our products or possibly help with an issue a member here is having, please just ask or pm me. I do not have all the answers, but will do everything in my power to find out for you. Remember, anyone can post anything on the net, period. It is my job as an Optima eCare manager to find out exactly what the problems are and report those back to the company while attempting to satisfy any unhappy customer. We are still learning that process and how to properly respond but we are here and ready to help when possible.
Thanks,
Bill Howell
eCare Manager, OPTIMA Batteries, Inc

 
Rep Power: 292

^ good to see that the company actually looks out for problems with their products

 
Rep Power: 813

yes i am glad he replied and cleared up all the info floating around. while my experience was negative, many others swear by optimas on other forums. i was just unlucky and might give them another shot in the future. what happened with my battery was i bought it from advance auto parts when i worked there, so i was able to choose the freshest battery that was only a few months old (most of the stock was a year old). i am well versed in optima batteries and even completed a required training course on them, as well as being a week away from ase certification. we had our very own dedicated optima battery charger that we would use all the time when customers brought back "dead" optimas. sometimes they came back to life and we gave the customer some tips to keep it working, but other times they simply would not hold a charge. that was what happened to my battery after about 2 yrs. i was able to recover some core credit towards a new regular battery. i know quite a bit about battery maintenance and what to do so my batteries last as long as possible, more than the average person. but in my case, the battery would slowly lose its ability to take a full charge until it would not even start the car despite my best efforts.