‘It is easy to damage’: Expert shares the right way to charge your battery if your car has automatic start-stop
Car maintenance, such as how to charge your battery, is important to know in case you ever get in trouble far away from civilization.
Recently, Lemon8 user @chequanxiaoqiao demonstrated how to charge a battery for a car with automatic start-stop.
What is automatic start-stop?
Automatic start-stop is a feature enabled by the auto start-stop button.
According to CJ Pony Parts, the auto start-stop button “Shuts off your vehicle’s engine when idling, then automatically starts it again when your foot leaves the brake pedal. This helps save fuel you’d otherwise waste sitting in traffic.”
How to charge your battery
Though @chequanxiaoqiao specifically mentions vehicles with an automatic start-stop button, her advice can be used for all vehicles.
In the video, she explains that people should not clip the negative clamp onto the battery. Instead, people should clip the negative clamp onto the engine and "clip the red or positive clamp to the positive battery terminal."
"There is a battery management system on the negative pole," @chequanxiaoqiao said. "The current is unstable when connecting to power. It is easy to damage the battery management system. The correct thing to do is clip the red one to the positive terminal of the battery, and the black one is clamped on the iron parts."
5 steps to jump your car
According to Car and Driver, jumping a car can be done in five easy steps. By following these steps, the whole process should take approximately 10-15 minutes.
The first step is to park the second vehicle that will be used to jump the dead battery as close to the other car as possible. The second step is to locate the battery terminals. These will be "clearly marked with a '+' and a '-' sign." The positive wire and terminal will usually be red and marked with the plus sign. If you're having trouble figuring out which terminal is negative and which is positive, check your owner's manual before proceeding. Additionally, make sure that the two wires are not touching.
The third step is to connect the cables to the battery terminal. Place the red clamp onto the positive terminal of the dead battery. Be sure to keep the black clamp away from the battery and any metal. Once you've placed the red clamp onto the dead battery, connect the other end to the other car's positive terminal. Then, connect the black clamp to the "good battery's negative terminal." Finally, connect the other black clamp to a piece of metal on the car with the dead battery.
Once you've attached everything, you start your engine. Then, "let it idle for two or three minutes, which will allow your vehicle's dead battery to gain some charge." If it doesn't start right away, then you should let it idle for 10-15 minutes.
Finally, disconnect the jumper cables. First, remove the negative clamp from "the bare metal connection," then remove the red clamp from the battery's positive terminal. After placing them on the ground, you remove the red clamp from the good battery and then the black clamp.
The Daily Dot reached out to @chequanxiaoqiao via Lemon8 comments.
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