Anybody have any experience with one of these?

NOCO Boost Plus GB40 1000A UltraSafe Car Battery Jump Starter

They rate it for gassers up to 6.0L and diesels up to 3.0L. I'm getting it for my SDL which is at a storage facility. It's parked in my outside stall, I have an indoor spot there where I can plug in a trickle charger. Trying to jump it with my 300D didn't work, this after hooked up for over 30 minutes. The charge is at low 11s (I wish I'd checked it before trying the jump), so I don't think the battery will die anytime soon. I'm not up on the science of how a battery can get low enough to impair its viability but I don't want to get an up close look at it. The batt is halfway new and wasn't cheap.

It occurred to me that perhaps I shouldn't be risking the integrity of my 300D alternator. Would be cheaper to buy a booster.

What worries me is shelling out $100 for this model only to find out it's insufficient when I could get the GB70 for @$200. It's rated for 8.0L gassers and 6.0L diesels. They say it's a 2000A, the GB40 is a 1000A.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

A 12V battery in the low 11's is very as in almost completely discharged. 10.5V is considered completely discharged and will harm the battery. A trickle charger will take a couple of days to charge a large capacity dead battery. My point is IMHO the state of your battery is the biggest problem at the moment. Any jump pack is going to be working overtime on that situation and yes it will tire the alternator early.

The battery needs to be fully charged to 12.5 or 12.6V and load tested.

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"Rudeness is a weak man's imitation of strength" - Eric Hoffer

Get the big marine deep cycle battery. Will start anything. I use one on a trolling motor on one of the boats. They last over ten years in service. will start anything. Has carry handles. Is heavy, very heavy. I have one from back in 2009 and it still works at about 90%. You can use this to light your place with 12v led's in a power outage and even run a TV and computer with an inverter. Instead of running the gen for almost no reason. You can charge it in your ride while driving if you run a fused line from the battery to it and ground it on anything, like a seat bolt.

I seem to have a talent for fukcing up. The SDL only sat for about a month before I last drove it around for a while. I didn't think it would sink that quickly. I have heard that a severly discharged battery will work the hell out of it's own alternator if jumped. Or that of a jumper vehicle.

All of sudden I'm leaning to just buying another battery. Not sure what their repuation is but there's an "Interstate Battery" outlet a couple of miles from where the SDL is. Their budget model is $165, the 'Better' variety is $220. Might just go for the cheapy, I'll have two batts at that point, I can trickle charge the 11+ volter at my leasure. And I'll really need to research battery tending. And I'll need to investigate how long a batt will last on the shelf and what one should do to enhance that.

It's sort of a tough call. A battery jump pack could come in handy. If the second battery won't do well with several years on the shelf, could be a better buy to get the booster pack, run the car for 5 minutes to get it into the indoor stall and start tending the battery better. I've heard for years about stressing the alternator with a discharged battery but if it's ever been a factor for me I wasn't aware of it. Have never had to replace alternators at too frequent a rate.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

You mean to use it like a jumper? I'm guessing it would be too big to get into the SDL battery holster.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

I'd suggest fully charging the existing battery and then load testing it. Next only with a fully charged good battery load test the charging system with the car running to measure BOTH alternator voltage AND amperage output. Lastly, again with a fully charged battery measure the starter draw, it will be in amps. You'll save a lot of time and money by testing first and the problem will be solved sooner.

I know of three types of flooded lead acid batteries:
1. An automotive starting battery,
2. A marine deep cycle battery and
3. A marine deep cycle/cranking battery.

Watch the cold crank amp rating on marine deep cycle batteries, they can be lower than automotive starting batteries. Check to make sure the CCA on any battery you are considering is sufficient/meets the car manufacturers specs.

Deep cycle batteries are built to withstand frequent charge/discharge cycles e.g., a boat trolling motor. I'm not saying it won't work, I'm saying check the specs.

Costco usually has great prices on Interstate batteries.

About having two batteries, if one is bad it's useless, recycle it and recoup the core charge.

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"Rudeness is a weak man's imitation of strength" - Eric Hoffer

Yes, I’ve had a NOCO GB40 for a few years. I don’t know if one would help in your situation, though. I’ve only needed to use it once, and it worked fine.

It stays charged up pretty well, stored in the trunk of my car. I bring it indoors and top off the charge about every 3 months. It requires very little time to get back to a full charge. It charges through a USB port. Sign up for emails from NOCO- I got a nice discount on mine during a Black Friday/cyber-Monday sale.

I also have a CTEK MUS 4.3 Test & Charge, and am very pleased with it. It can test the battery condition, as well as the alternator. I picked it up a few years ago, when I was having battery problems- it diagnosed a *bad alternator. Amazon has them.

Best wishes.

*Edit to add: For enquiring minds: no, it wasn’t the voltage regulator that caused the alternator failure. It had a new voltage regulator.

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Marshall Welch
Seattle, WA
1982 300D-T

1000A sound like a stout boost box. You’d have to try it of course.

My experience is with the harbor freight Viking lithium ion box rated at 450A. It won’t crank my om617 turbo. No way. I get a click and the jump box reads discharged. I can put it on my completely dead 2008 civic and it’ll start it twice and not lose a bar of charge.

I bought it when I recovered my 300D from the PO. It didn’t work. We called AAA and the guy showed up with two old style jump boxes and used them in parallel. That did the trick.

Now if I go do a recovery on a diesel Mercedes I’ll just bring one of my Mercedes diesels with the H8 battery and a set of cables.

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79 300TD “Old Smokey” AKA “The Mistake” (SOLD)
82 240D stick shift 335k miles (SOLD)
82 300SD 300k miles
85 300D Turbodiesel 170k miles
97 C280 147k miles

I recently did a lot of shopping for a jump pack also, perhaps my knowledge will help: the smaller lithium ion packs that claim they can start a big diesel will just not work to start an om617. I have tried that and failed. So, I went to Farbor Height and got their biggest Viking jump pack with an air compressor on sale. It’s a lead acid battery, so it jumps a big diesel without even trying. The difference is astounding.

Do not buy the cheap battery. I just replaced a 24 month battery from Pep Boys in my Lexus. It lasted exactly 25 months.

No jump pack is going to start our diesels with a dead battery connected.
11V is dead.

12V is dead…

12.3 is jumpable… 12.6 is nearly full…

The lithium packs that weigh 2lbs plus will work if they have a charge up feature…

I agree with everybody else, charge or replace the battery.

Jump packs are great, and the 1200A models that weigh a ton will start, but ya gotta let it charge the battery up.

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John HAUL AWAY, OR CRUSHED CARS!!! HELP ME keep the cars out of the crusher! A/C Thread
"as I ride with my a/c on... I have fond memories of sweaty oily saturdays and spewing R12 into the air. THANKS for all you do!

My drivers:
1987 190D 2.5Turbo
1987 560SL convertible
1987 190D 2.5-5SPEED!!!

1987 300TD
2005 Dodge Sprinter 2500 158"WB
1994GMC 2500 6.5Turbo truck... I had to put the ladder somewhere!

Heh… I built a jump box with 4 100Ah LiFePO4 cells and it sends 14.4V to the starter at 300A! FAST cranks with a dead battery connected… no problem.

Of course it weighs 75 lbs…

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John HAUL AWAY, OR CRUSHED CARS!!! HELP ME keep the cars out of the crusher! A/C Thread
"as I ride with my a/c on... I have fond memories of sweaty oily saturdays and spewing R12 into the air. THANKS for all you do!

My drivers:
1987 190D 2.5Turbo
1987 560SL convertible
1987 190D 2.5-5SPEED!!!

1987 300TD
2005 Dodge Sprinter 2500 158"WB
1994GMC 2500 6.5Turbo truck... I had to put the ladder somewhere!

I bought the NOCO GB40, I was able to get it started, more on that later. First things first, I've had this charger for years. It doesn't say 'battery tender' anywhere but the description implies that it is:



That's not as legible as I had hoped. Says:

Cycles off when charge is complete.
Cycles on when more charge is needed.

frurther down:

Automatic overload protection.

I put it in the garaged storage space and hooked up the charger. The batt read real close to 12.0, this after moving it and shutting it off. I don't want to fry the battery by leaving it hooked up for too long. This charger is not young but I've never had a problem with it.

The hard part for me is how do I know it's working as advertised? What would be the proof that it is not? The battery ruined?

This is an issue as I'm about 25 miles from where it's stored. I don't want to pop in every day. The only affordable full storage is in the industrial part of Hayward.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

12.0 is about 50% charge, depending on your unit. On my big marine I drew it down to 12.0 this summer on remote pumping . Calculating using the amp hours it has spec'd, I figured how long it would take to get to 12.6 ... and it did exactly that. I used a 6.2 amp charger to get those 62 amps back in there in 10 hours. Like clockwork. I don't much trust chargers, especially old tech. Charge it all the way and then take it off there and disconnect the battery. it should hold just fine or it has a problem.

2a automatic is a maintenance charge setting.
I would be comfortable leaving this connected.

__________________
John HAUL AWAY, OR CRUSHED CARS!!! HELP ME keep the cars out of the crusher! A/C Thread
"as I ride with my a/c on... I have fond memories of sweaty oily saturdays and spewing R12 into the air. THANKS for all you do!

My drivers:
1987 190D 2.5Turbo
1987 560SL convertible
1987 190D 2.5-5SPEED!!!

1987 300TD
2005 Dodge Sprinter 2500 158"WB
1994GMC 2500 6.5Turbo truck... I had to put the ladder somewhere!