Mspeedster

I recently got the cheaper OEM Porsche Battery maintainer. I usually only drive the car on the weekends, so thought this would be a good idea.

I’m just wondering what’s the longest time anyone has experienced to get their battery back to a full charge?

Instructions say the light will go out when the battery is fully charged. I’ve had it plugged in for a day and half and the light is still on. Granted, my battery was probably on a low charge, since it had not been driven in a while.

LlBr

My guess? Porsche battery maintainer I have is 500 milliamps (I think). Our car's battery capacity is 80 ampere hours (I think). Therefore it would take more than 160 hours to get a full change on a "dead" battery. "More than" because it's not an exact relationship since charging process is complex. Your situation seems okay.

At Law

I don't know if the battery maintainer will ever fully recharge
an extremely low battery. You may have to hook the battery
to a battery charger to get the charge back up--and then
you can maintain the battery charge with the maintainer.

To answer your question regarding length of time the maintainer
will stay lit (charge to full), mine "runs" for no more than
two or three hours at most.

NA011

My car is a 2006 with a production date of 12/23/2005. The battery is still the factory original. Most of the time my maintainer's charging light stays lit ~1 - 2 hrs. after I plug it in. However after I add distilled water (~ 2 times a year) to top it off, the charging light will stay lit for 3-4 days unless I take it for a good drive after adding the water.

ADias

I think that the old battery maintainer charges at around 0.75A. A car that is parked for a week will take close to 1 day to replenish. It is correct that the old maintainer will not recharge a heavy depleted battery. The new dual-mode charger (made by CTek) will, with its 3A mode.

stevepow

I have the CTEK - my car had been on the lot probably 6 mos when I got it and the first time I used the maintainer, it took about a day. Now it is a hour or so maybe.

RED 997

I Just bought the cheaper version also. Took over 24 hours for the light to go out first time I used it. Now it takes several hours after first plugged in after a drive.

JoeShark

+1 Exactly the same here.

sharmat

Just as a tip from my experience, if the light starts to stay on longer and more ferquently it might be a sign that the battery is on the way out. I ignored this sign; the car had enough juice to get stared from home. But quickly died miles later far from home. New battery was the answer.

Edgy01

The bottom line is that the 997 is a big user of electrical energy. If you're going longer than 4 years on a battery you're lucky--and you will get stuck sometime. (Make sure you're parked on a hill).

NA011

No hills around here. The dealer did a load test on the battery in early December and said everything was fine. My 2 year old Land Rover battery died 2 weeks ago on a 26 degree morning. So on the same cold morning I took the Porsche to the Interstate battery shop & they did a battery load test & everything was fine. They said come back in June for another load test. In the mean time I'm keeping Coochsa Mobile bookmarked on my Blackberry.