Hi,
I've tried to find an answer to the question before going to the dealer (I moved from the States with my Mini and the dealership here is extremely expensive) with the problem I encountered after recharging the battery.
The problem is that my car was left idle for 3 months and I was stupid enough not to take the battery out. So when I tried to turn it on, it emerged that the battery was dead. So I recharged the battery and could turn on the car etc, but something was messed up in the electrical system and the radio won't work. It actually worked for like 45 minutes, but after that just went dead while driving and hasn't been able to turn it on ever since.
I checked both the 5 and 15A fuses and they're ok, so before going to the dealership and paying big bucks for the diagnostics, thought to ask, whether anyone else has had this problem and if so, did you find a solution?
Thanks for the help.

 

Hmmm... I was going to say check the fuses but it looks like you already did that. I'd still replace them just to be sure that they didn't pop and you just can't see it. If it still won't work, I'd disconnect the stereo wiring harness, leave it unplugged for a bit then reconnect it.

When you say you "recharged" the battery - did you jump the car and let the car itself recharge it, or did you use some sort of plug-in recharger? Worst case, you might have damaged the solid-state controls that interface with the stereo, but I'd check all the obvious, mechanical stuff first.

 

When you recharged the battery, you DID take the battery out of the Mini first... right?

 

You can leave the battery in place while charging, as long as you have the right kind of charger. An "intelligent", low-current charger like the Battery Tender Plus won't harm any of the electronics in your car, but using any of the 25-amp "fast chargers" is asking for trouble.

 

You can, but it's a bad idea.

Forgetting the car's electronics for the moment, batteries can explode when being charged. Happened to me. Fifteen seconds after I hooked up the charger and walked away, it went off like a grenade. If it had been in the car at the time, I would have had some blast damage.

Always best to remove the battery, place it on something wooden, then charge it.

However, my main point was if the Mini's battery cables were still connected when the charger was on. Might have fried something.

 

When you say you checked both fuses - did you check the fuse ON the RADIO? I'd check that one if you haven't. If you're no longer under warranty, take the radio out and check it - if you replace it and it blows again or it's good - just get a new radio off of eBay.

 

Thx for all the replies.
Yes, I took the battery out from the car before charging it. But it still wouldn't start, so I had to jump-start it with another car first and then the battery started to charge itself.
I'll try replacing the fuses, hopefully that will help. But Foxtrot_Xray, what do you mean by fuse ON the radio? I checked the two on the left hand side under the steering wheel, is there another one? And btw, taking out the radio, is that easy to do with all the interior fairing? I know that when it comes to accessibility, the Mini is not exactly the role model as everything is so packed together
Unfortunately my car is not under warranty in Europe, it would be in the States, but I'm not shipping it back there for that :(

 

Yeah, the radio has it's own tiny fuse in the back of IT, where the wirting harness plugs in. (It's red one. Can' remember the amerage at the moment.) For getting to the center console, you'd have to remove the two downubes, which would involve either removing the center speedo facia or the bottom shifter/cupholder piece. Not HARD, just time consuming. There are several posts around here that describe how to do it. It depends on your MINI's year, as well.

 

My MCS is charged every two weeks... infact it is charging right now.

I do not disconnect any thing but the feed going to my BassLink in the trunk. I use that to charge the battery at 2A. Takes about 16 to 18 hours dependong on the temp inside the garage (how much power lost). I use a smart charger from Sears.

 

Risi is correct. There is absolutely no need to remove the battery from the car these days. See http://batterytender.com/default.php?cPath=11_2 You can google Battery Tender Plus and get the price down to about $45.

1.25 Amp current, intelligent design, once it gets to 95% it goes into tending mode. It is NOT a trickle charger like in the old days. Rather, if it senses the voltage drop below a threshold, it just sends a short pulse to the battery.

In fact, using such a device will make your battery last longer as it conditions the battery.

Sure, batteries can explode. I would never use one of the fast charging ones. The battery tender plus is not even state of the art anymore as new ones have four phases instead of three (and cost twice as much).

I can speak first hand on this as my Croc as rested all February, outside, undercover through all the ice storms and maybe twice a week, I put the latest battery tender on it. You can also take it to the bank that thousands, literally thousands, of P-cars just sit all winter with a tender on them. They are designed to just sit there all winter long without ever being touched.

Sorry to hear yours blew up Gromit but was it a fast charger or trickle charger?

 

Battery Tenders are great - I have a couple for the bikes and the cars that don't get driven frequently.

The only limitation is that the protection circuitry won't allow you to charge a severely-drained battery without some "trickery", but the battery has to be *really* flat for that to happen.

 

I have a large, commercial garage type multi-choice charger. But in the case of the "Battery Bomb," it was on slow charge.

 

Just a thought....

Both my mother and father have BMWs I remember going through one of their manuals and finding out that if for some reason the radio had no power (removing the battery) it would not work when power was restored. I believe that this was a theft deterrent measure. However, I remember that there was a way to regain radio function either by a dealer trip or entering a secret code or something.

I guess what I'm saying is that the radio may have the same "theft deterrant system that incapacitates the radio until some action on your part. Hope you get the radio fixed soon...at least we MINI owners have a awesome sounding car to help us through those times without music.

 

<hijack>
Care to expand on the "trickery"? I've got a miata that has a big appetite for batteries, and drained a new Westco. Had it on the Battery Tender for two days and it's still not registering 'fully charged' :impatient. TIA!
</hijack>

 

If it's a blade-type fuse then red = 10A. You have spares in the fuse box, or a pack of 5 costs about $2 at any auto parts pace or even WalMart.

 

I don't think our radios have that permanent power off feature/theft deterrant thing. Before getting my HU permanently replace, mine was in/out of the car many times, and never had an issue.

ImagoX - Yup, you're right. It's a 10A. However, to my eye it looks smaller than the 'standard' ones in the fuse panel.. (Mine's out of my car, so I didn't have the Mini to check against.)

Cheers!
Me.

 

They make a smaller version of the standard blade fuses - I think they're called "mini ATX" or something, but I believe the color coding is the same as the full-size ATX ones.

 

dtr,

You might want to take a look at one of these as they work well for a slow charge and maintenance. They are also very reasonably priced

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=42292

I have been using them for years from P-cars to Loti to Motorcycles and back.

The radios in the Minis do not have secret codes and can be taken out fairly easily (as previously mentioned, suggested, and verified). However, be careful with the connections, especially the antenna one, as they can be rather fragile if you don't take some care. The first time I removed my head unit I did not understand the clip removal of the antenna connection so it was released, but fortunately I did not break it.

I'd definitely recommend checking the fuse on the back of the head unit (as suggested). The other thing that may need to be looked into more would be ground connections as sometimes they are not as good as they could be. Maybe good just to renew some of them. I had to as I was having some difficulty with the center console that resulted in a not as good as possible ground.

Hope you get your radio back to normal soon.

 

The radio fuse is a 10 amp ATM 'mini' blade-style fuse. It's alongside the ahrness connector on the back of the radio. Note that the fuse is smaller in physical size than the fusebox-mounted "ATO" blade-style fuses.

Some battery chargers with 'smart' circuitry and protection measure built in will not charge a completely dead battery. The charger works by sensing the remaining few volts on a 'dead' battery to determine proper connection polarity, then does a sort of 'assessment' of the condition of the battery before it actually starts charging. Such chargers also keep their terminals 'dead' as a safety measure to prevent arcing if you short them together. If a battery is completely discharged, there is nothing for the smart charger to sense and assess, so charging never begins.

The solution to these situations is to use an old school trickle charger that blindly puts out a charging voltage. A completely discharged battery will not draw any charging current until the battery becomes 'polarized' once again. Such a charging regimen will take over 24 hours to complete, and the battery will likely need to be charged for several more hours to be completely satisfied. Note that any typical starting battery that has experienced such a deep discharge might not completely regain it's original capacity.

Using old style 'starter' chargers often pump more than 16 volts into a car's electrical system, especially if the battery's charge is so low and unable to soak up the charging current. Voltages this high can damage electronics present in today's cars. Modern chargers have sophisticated regulating circuitry that prevent overvoltage conditions.

If the radio had been playing fine and then stopped, the fault might just be in the radio itself. Pull both fuses supplying power to the radio and wait several minutes, then reinstall. This will often 'reset' the radio and make things work again. If the radio has gone into 'anti-theft' mode, the display will usually read 'CODE', meaning it is waiting for the security code to be entered to unlock the radio. MINI radios have two modes of security, 'CODE' and 'KBUS' KBUS is the default, and this essentially means that the radio will talk to the various controllers in the car to see if they are the same as before. No code is necessary then.

 

That's the info I was fumbling for - thanks 'Bear.

 

First, the easy part - has the green "80% light" started flashing yet? If you've been stuck at that stage for an inordinate amount of time, try "re-booting" the Battery Tender by unplugging it from the battery and the wall for a minute or two. Reconnect it to the battery and wall outlet, and see where you are in a few hours.

If the problem is that the red light is still blinking, then the protection circuitry is kicking in because the battery voltage is so low that the Tender can't confirm that the leads are connected to the correct terminals. (The positive lead has to register at least three volts higher than the negative lead for the Tender to be sure the leads are connected to the correct terminals). With the red light blinking, charging hasn't even begun.

To trick the charger into starting, leave it connected to the dead battery, and briefly connect a good battery across the leads of the Tender. I usually do this by connecting jumper cables to a good battery, and then briefly touching the other end of the jumper cables to the Tender's leads (which are still connected to the dead battery). Make sure you're connecting positive-to-positive and negative-to-negative on the two batteries.

This will momentarily raise the voltage across the leads enough to let the Tender know that the leads are connected properly, and charging will begin. You'll know it worked because the flashing red light will go solid red.

 

But the problem with that .. I also got a large Sears Diehard charger, is that low might still mean 6 AMPS rather than 14 or fast charging for starting 50 ... that "low" just is not the same thing as the latest tenders ... apples and oranges.

Eric, You got the info on how to trick it but ...

It depends upon the amperage. Most likely its 1.5 AMPS and its not uncommon to wait 3 days (full days) and that with a battery thats actually fine and you drive the car. Mine is 3 amps and says 3 days may be normal so it might take 5 days at 1.5 or more.

 

Good point - I think the charge current on the Battery Tender/Battery Tender Plus is only 1.25 Amps. Fully charging a dead car battery can easily take three days.

I guess the short answer for Eric is that if the red charging light is solid, unplug the tender from the battery and the wall to re-boot it, reconnect everything and give it another day.

If the red light is flashing instead, use the polarity trick I described, and then once charging starts, you may have to wait three days for the battery to fully charge.

 

Thanks for the info guys. It's never taken that long before, but the above gives me more confidence that I'm doing more than just wasting electrons.

 

Chows, just to put the answer out there, what caused my battery to explode some years back had nothing to do with the charger. When a battery charges, hydrogen gas is created, and the battery in question had somehow developed a short internally. The gas sparked within. BOOOOM!