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Testing every battery in the fall is a ‘right-selling’ opportunity By Ann Neal
A
ll but the youngest drivers remember when a slow cranking start or dim headlights signaled a dying batery. Tose days are gone. Modern vehicles start instantly until — with no warning — they don’t. Many no-start problems occur when temperatures drop just a few degrees. In warm weather, a vehicle’s electronics compensate for the lower power output of a marginal batery. Tat doesn’t happen when temperatures dip. A batery loses 35% of its power at 32 degrees, says John Philbrook, director of the afermarket transportation group at Midtronics Inc. Citing statistics from the not-for-proft Batery Council International, he says a batery at 32 degrees can only produce 65% of the power it
had at 80 degrees. “As it gets colder the batery loses the power to produce energy, and the car requires more energy to crank it. At the frst cold spell, no-starts are widespread. “Te benefts of a tire dealer geting into the market today have never been beter because bateries and vehicles give absolutely no forewarning before a no-start,” he says. Philbrook compares the fnal stages of batery life to standing on the edge of a clif. “Bateries don’t have a nice trend line when they get to the fnal stage of their useful life. You don’t know you’re standing on the edge of the clif or even starting to fall down it until instead of a slow start you get absolutely nothing at all.”
The 3200 battery tester from Bosch interfaces with a smart device to read and display battery data contained on the tool’s QR code. A full-color battery report can be printed, saved or emailed to your customers.
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MTD August 2015
