Optima Yellow-Top Battery Crapped Out...
 

My Optima Yellow-Top Battery in my 04 LX Coupe crapped out on me after a little (very little) over a year. Just thought I'd let everyone know... Ran a 1000w Mono Sub for 2 months... THAT'S IT! If you have any suggestions of what I should get next, let me know. Thanks. Peace.

trunk mount the biggest group 27 you can get, that is what i had to do but i had more power draw, then i again i have three caps too...

next time get a RED TOP

my yellow top crapped on me after a year and a half also, i was only running 500 watts and custom fog lights the whole time i had it. im switching to red top in spring

I have a 2000w amp 1000w sub running off my yellow top for 2 years now. Nothing wrong with it....yet.
Make sure you are using it as a second auxilary battery instead of relpacing/using as your starter battery, that will put less stress on it.

im using yellowtop battery also, i hope it doesnt crap out on me, either way, i got 2 year warranty so if it does break then i can gotoautozone and they will replace for free/

so u pay 130 for a battery which goes out on u after a year...doesnt sound good...im stickin with stock until i can do everything properly

yellow tops aren't designed to replace the starting battery found under the hood, rather be a auxilary power source for ICE. If you wanna replace the battery under the hood, get a red top

Which yellow top did you get? There are two of them. One has a gark grey case, and one has a lite grey case. If memory serves correctly, when replacing the stock battery, and using the optima for starting purposes, you want the lite grey one, as it's designed for starting the vehicle, and the dark grey one is to be used as a secondary battery. In any event, one is designed to be used for secondary purposes only. The other is to be used for either, and can be used as a starting battery. Make sure you have the correct yellow top, as the one that's not made to be used as a starting battery should have died that quick.

Optima makes a great product, maybe the problem lies not with the battery but with the user.

k20lxem2, under what reasoning do you make that recommendation?

If you want an Optima to replace your stock battery and you have a large system, yellow top is what you want.

If you want to look to another brand to buy a battery from now that your Optima is toast, look at an Exide 34XCD.

i would go with the red top for a replacement and put a yellowtop in the trunk or under the rear passanger seats for the system...they also have smaller stereo system batterys availible too

i have a light grey one because that was the only one autozone had. the dark grey one wasnt there.. i didnt even know yellow top has 2 kinds.

i am using yellow top for about 1 year and a half. i didn't run any sub or amp. and i can leave my car off and have my audio on for about over 1 hour then start my car with no problem!!

A dark gray case means starting technology, a light gray case means dual purpose (engine start and deep cycle) technology (That's from Optima's website)

Seems like they've changed it a little. used to, one was made for starting, and the other for secondary purposes. That may be the case. In any event, it should still be under warranty. I'd still go for the dark grey case so I know it's better suited to start the car.

Mine died too. Check with the company cause they have a 2 or 3 year warranty.

mine is going strong at least a year now. They're supposed to be good batteries and for starting too. Much better than stock. Even after 2 weeks of sitting it starts up great. Can't say the same for stock.

if ur runnin alot of ampers on the battery and ur alt cant keep up optima's are horrible at recharging below 9volt. if u dont know wut im talkin about get a higher crank rated battery. sumthin over 2000cc will work great. odessy, excide, gnb- personal favorite, kinetics, svr's. those are all batteries meant to run more than ur normal starting of car and power needs so take a look at them and leave optima's at autozone, dont get me wrong there great batteries but there like buying jl's for spl.

why would you need a battery rated for over 2000cca when your system will never ever ever ever ever draw that much?

wait................

why optima only suggest YEL51R (yellowtop?) for our car?

i don't see the option for redtop...........:confused:

the group 51 is the only battery that actually fits (same size as stock). The others are too big but you can force fit it.

mine died to, now i got a cheapo o battery, and no system now.. =( i thinkn of getting biggest battery they have and trunk it. gotta relocated battery for turbo any ways right?

with lil stereos no u dont, but with a big boy stereo u need as much as possible. it also never hurts to have extra, just my 2cents if U dont see a reason for it then dont say no one needs it. if u ever run a real amp like a us amps usa6000 "which draws up to 900amp of current at full tilt" or sumother real power amps that produce over 5kw rms, then u would know u need as many and as big of batteries possible. not trin to miss lead this post with useless info, just trin to help out.

I had 2 crap out on me. One after about 10.5 months, and one was after 13 months. I got a free replacement the first time, but the second was no luck. I'm running a 1 farad lightning audio cap as well. I've never heard of this "Yellow top not to replace primary battery." No one has ever said that in the years I've searched this board. For now I have the autozone cheapo battery I hadda buy when I was waiting for my first Optima replacement. I figure if it lasts a year, it is the equivalent to an optima.

P.S. I wouldn't actually call it a free replacement either. I had to pay $40 to ship it myself, $25 to cover the fee to send it back to me, and $60 for a temporary replacement.

900 amps :eek: What do you run for cable 10 X 000?

id like to see this amp

edit:

I found the amp, but no pictures of the actual amplifier. Does it really exist?

http://www.usamps.com/old_site/produ...v/usa-6000.htm

the amp does exist but its rare and not many ppl can afford a 5grand amp. yes u need alot of wire usually 0/3 or 0/4 or welding cable if u can get some, but to keep this amp happy it needs easy 4 2000cca+ batteries on it other wise the amp will go into protect cause of the voltage drop. to keep 4 batteries happy and a 900amp draw u need a bigars alt or 2 if u wanna play it while drivin. the one we installed we did 4 custom iraggi 250amp alt's. so back to my original post, yes some ppl need over 2000cca. y do u think they have a limit for size in db drag street competion? if u didnt need it y put a limit on the size which happens to be 2150cca. optima's are great batteries but if the voltage drops below 9volt they have a tough time recharging thats y i said there not the best for audio systems.

some people do need over 2000cca, but the cars needing those are far from daily drivers

Thanks for all the help guys! Well, I'm running my stock battery for now... Not running any sounds so it should be all right. I can't believe it started the car after it's been sitting for 14 months. Lucky for me it did. Anyway, tomorrow I'm going to take it down to CarQuest to see if it can hold a charge (which I highly doubt since it still wouldn't work after 2 hours of alt. recharge). If it can't be recharged then I'll be getting another battery under warranty, which I will be selling. So if anyone in Honolulu wants an Optima Yellow-Top let me know! In the future I'm going to pick up an Odyssey Drycell (SN#PC925MJT). Hopefully that will work out better for me, and if anyone has experience with this battery let me know. Thanks again everybody! Happy tuning!

Good point! I Was considering buying a yellow top but that sounds like a pretty crappy warrenty to me, the LEAST they could do is cover return shipping. Thats some pretty crappy customer service if you ask me. Probably be even more expensive for us canadians. Anybody know another company that sells a similar battery with a better warrenty?

Currently I got 2 amps running 2 subs and internal speakers and been using my stock battery since i bought the car in 2001, battery still works fine but thats because I try my best to avoid running the system off the battery.

What do you run it off of? The flux capacitor? :lol: