I only drive my MCS on the weekends and that's probably what my
problem is. Anyway, I started my charge tonight and my charger's LED
is blinking indicating a sulfated battery. The car turns-over but
I think this might be the last season the battery will live.

I have a Optima yellow top so I guess I'll be using that pretty soon.

I haven't checked the water level, but have any of you had to add
distilled water to revived your batteries?

 

thats odd, i dont drive my car on a regular basis as well. only when the sun shines. sometimes i dont drive it weeks on end when chicago has its week or longer rain spells. that has never happened to me before.

so the car would not start in the first place? or were there symptoms beforehand?

also, wont cant you get another batter from the dealer?

 

Starting it everyweekend should keep the battery charge. I would check the water and add distilled if ou need. How old is the battery? If you do need a new one shop around for one that has a 3 year replacement warranty.

Check out this site it has some good info: http://www.uuhome.de/william.darden/....htm#sulfation

It seems if you have a cheapo charger it could cause the sulfation.

Let us know if you figure out the cause.

 

The car starts fine. The reason for this charge is top off the battery.
Here is where I hooked up the terminals:

(+) to the battery terminal under the bonnet next to the intake.
(-) to the motor mount bolt on the driver side.

I went back to check on the charger after about 45min into the charge
to find the red light blinking on the charger..(failed charge).
hummm... perhaps the MCS battey does not like the 2A charge?
I didn't want to use the full 12A because I know the battery isn't
empty. Also I may have bad groud with the motor mount bolt?

The charger works fine on all my other cars and batteries that I
have and had in the past....I always use 2A on a battery that is not
completely empty and on deep cycle batteries. Does MINI require
a certain charge rate? (amps) kinda odd...

 

I have a MINI/BMW 2 amp charger that plugs into the cig. lighter.Works great if the car has to sit at cold temps for more than a day or so.Cold meaning -30 and colder.

 

Thanks, I think I'll try that next time.

Not sure how different that is from charging 2A with my charger..hummm...

 

I have a "battery conditioner" trickle charger that has a special setting for desulphating batteries by "pulse charging." Not sure if it works, but it is designed to be hooked up all the time in the winter to keep things all ready to go in an emergency. I use it on my tractor, which gets little use in the winter.

A spiral cell battery like the Optima should never sulphate. Every time I need to replace a battery nowadays, I get an Optima, if just for the fact that you never add water or worry about leakage.

 

Yah, I think I might change to my yellow top if I keep having problems
with my factory battery.