Great time for a dead battery. Winter sux!

[Budnicks]

LOL... we're all over 60 now, other than little Paul that's 49, and this is what you call SUCKS! -34C and stuck in a mile long slush field for 3 hours at 8AM... If it hadn't been for sunshine and zero wind, not even a breeze, the outcome wouldn't have been good!View attachment 1593803View attachment 1593804View attachment 1593805View attachment 1593806View attachment 1593807View attachment 1593808

Nice fish...

 

[RJRENTON]

Looking out the window this week, I laugh when people ask me if I miss driving a truck. Picture was taken in January, 2008. Single digit weather, plus wind chill, fast idle all night to keep fuel from gelling.
View attachment 1593450

When I was in industry and ran an 85 man maintenance department in a chemical plant, we had outdoor material handing equipment including an 85 ton GE locomotive with Cummins N-855L engines, six crawler cranes with magnets with GM/DDA 8V-92 TURBO DIESELS, and two with GM 6-71 engines. To prevent fuel gelling, caused by the paraffin coming out of solution, and blind the primary fuel filters. In the winter, i switched from #2 diesel to #1 diesel. #1 diesel is a blend of 50% #2 diesel and 50% kerosene plus #1 diesel has a higher CETANE RATING (similar to high octane gasoline), which promote faster starting and slightly better fuel economy. I bnought the #1 fuel directly from the supplier, ready to use....no more fuel gelling issues.....recommended......
BOB RENTON

 

[Daves69]

Question is, should I jump it and see if the battery charges up OK, or figure 4-1/2 years is reasonable life and it's time for replacement?

IMO, you're better off to fully charge it before starting if you can "if" it will take a charge. I had a similar dead battery issue a couple winters back with a 3 year old battery in my '05 Ram.
It took a charge but I was skeptical for it lasting much longer. I decided to zip tie a charger/maintainer in it for the rest of the season similar to this........

Masterforce™ 3-Amp Digital Battery Charger and Maintainer

The 3A 6/12V MFSP1297 Battery Charger/Maintainer is great for motorcycle, car and marine batteries. It?s energy efficient and fully automatic. The clamp and ring terminal adapters are easy to connect, and the convenient hook attachment lets you hang the unit outside of the work area.

www.menards.com

The charger is still in the truck with that same battery today. With the temps we had around Chi, this truck started OK but not without some whining and groaning!

 

[dadsbee]

Maintainers, not on my junk..... boom...

 

[Daves69]

I'll let ya' know when it blows!

 

[Xp29h]

Just replaced the battery in the Ram power wagon. Of course it wasn’t cheap! It would start no problem but the second you turn things on, I’d get the battery saver mode warning and certain systems would shut off.

weird thing was battery tested fine. Put a load on it and still tested fine. But the longer the load, down it went. Big difference with Volts and Amps. I replaced it with a larger cranking amp battery but those darn volts and amps can get ya!

New battery, no issues and we’re at a nice balmy 4 degrees!

I always keep this with and ready to go. Of course it wouldn’t help if the hood is frozen!