How do I tell if the battery is Original in my 2006 MCS or not? I got it from a dealership and they didn't punch out the date on the sticker. It's got 60k on it and I really don't want to have it strand me. I was just wondering if there was a OEM battery that Mini uses? Normally 60k is about the time they seem to go bad, but I've never had a Mini before so this is all new. ???

 

I still have the oem battery. It is white with no manufacturers label and has a yellow MINI wings multilingual information sticker in the upper left hand corner as you peer down on. It's replacement will probably be a Duralast or Interstate battery.

 

Even if you could see a date it is no guarantee that the battery is either good or bad. If you are concerned then take it into your local auto parts store and ask them to check out the health of your battery. That way you will know if it is good or not.

 

Unfortunately, there is no a way to make sure if the battery is original or not..

All what you can do is to take it to someone specialist and he may recognize it, but that is not guaranteed...

 

Check the voltage. If the car has recently been running, remove the surface charge
by cranking a few seconds with the plug wires off or the coil disconnected and then waiting a few minutes.
State of charge is about
12.65V - 100%
12.45V - 75%
12.24V - 50%
12.06V - 25%
a 5-6 year old battery will probably only show about 12.3-12.5V even when "fully" charged.

Next do a load test. remove the spark plug wires and crank for 15 seconds.
The minimum voltage you see should be above 9.7 V at 80F, 9.4 V at 50F, or
9.1V at 30F ambient temperature.

Wait 10 minutes, the charge should bounce back to at least 75% charge (12.45V) for
a good battery.

This info should give a clue whether the battery is 6 years old or just 1-2 years old,
and can also tell you when it's nearing time to change it.
Fall is a great time to check older batteries, so that you can change it at your convenience before
winter comes and does them in unexpectedly.

Here's a more complete reference for batteries. Look at page 2 and 3.
http://autorepair.about.com/library/.../aa101604a.htm

 

The plastic case, or in some cases the terminal on a mini usually has a date code imprinted on them....much like a tire...
But with a battery, a date is only one indication of possible condition....
mini oem batts tend to be kinda short lived....and tend to fail unexpectedly...many 2004 cars got new ones for free when dealers found they were failing in less than 3 years (my car missed the production date cutoff by a few weeks, but still got 4 years from the factory batt.
My suggestion....
If you are worried, just spend the $100 on a new bat...or cary a $20 set of jumper cables!!
It is impossible to know how the battery was treated before you got the car, if it ws garaged, deeply discharged, etc....
The above tests can give a indication....but it could fail tomorrow...or last 5 more years....feeling lucky?!

 

One thing to note...just a guess...
My old 2005 oem mini batt, like most factory oem battery (just looked...still have it for a future core use) did not have a place to punch out little dots to indicate a date...so i'd bet a few $$ it was a dealer replacement.
That having been said....if the oem bats are good for a 36-48 months.....could be in the last 12 months of the expected life.