You can't go by battery voltage with out placing a load on it. As batteries age sulfidation occurs on the internal plates. As this continues the batteries loose capacity. They may still hold 14 volts with no load but can no longer carry the amp draw needed. Your local auto parts store can test the capacity of the battery. Group 40, 47 and 48 batteries will fit with the group 48 being the exact same dimensions as the factory battery. As long as it is a round 600 CCA with a 70 amp/hour rating or better you can use. One note of caution that can be easy to overlook. Make sure the battery you buy comes with the vent hole on the side to plug the vent tube into. All lead acid batteries gas when charging producing sulfur dioxide and hydrogen. Directly behind your battery is the cabin air filter. This is where outside air enters the cabin when the environmental system is not on recirculate.

 

Almost forgot. If the negative terminal of your battery does not have an additional connector on it with wires coming of it then you do not have IBS monitoring and no battery registration is necessary. If you do have the IBS option then battery registering is recommended to maximize your new battery life. But it is not absolutely necessary. I use the Carly for BMW app on my phone to run diagnostics, clear error codes, reset service checks and do battery registration.

 

 

 

Yep thats an IBS connector on the negative terminal. I'd recommend registering a new battery.

 

 

Yep, just make sure to register it and you should be fine. I dont see the cross ref for that battery but the CCA and CA should be close to the same and the size and terminal placement should be the same as the old one.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...nt-help-2.html

 

 

Did you ask Mini if this is covered under 4yr/50k warranty?

 

 

That battery should be fine. My wife’s 2014 R57 and my 2013 R58 JCW battery’s went bad with in a week of each other. I just went the local parts store and grabbed a new battery. I used my Foxwell to register them. All is good with both cars

 

My battery died in my R58 JCW because before i bought it, the owner had the car sitting for long period of time and never trickled charged it. If MINI sees that they can deny a warranty, they did on mine. They pulled the info and could see it was sitting with a few starts and the battery low for months. I got a new one and it was good to go , then just register with the schwaben tool.

 

What is the purpose to register a battery? I may miss something here.

 

Its just to reset the system, the IBS will control the amount of charge the alternator will give overtime to prolong the battery. That's what its based off of.

 

As the battery ages I believe the IBS will increase charge rate. If you do not register you may be putting wrong charge to your new battery shortening its life. In the UK mini uses a AGM battery which is a lot more costly than the standard one. I payed £150 for AGM battery and £20 for local auto electrician to register battery.