Can you believe that my battery in my 86 300sdl died today and it was only 16 years old. It was a huge Bosch battery. I guess it served its purpose very well.
What have people been using for new batteries in a 300sdl? My choice of stores are O'Reilly, Advance Auto Parts and Autozone. No one sells Bosch anymore.
Any and all input is appreciated.

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John
1986 300sdl
1985 380se

wow. how many miles?

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I thought I was doing good. 9yrs 5mo on a Costco battery in my Datsun PU.

Never gave me any trouble. then last month, poof, wouln`t turn the engine over.

You should get the award on longest lived battery.

Charlie

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there were three HP ratings on the OM616...

1) Not much power
2) Even less power
3) Not nearly enough power!! 240D w/auto

Anyone that thinks a 240D is slow drives too fast.

80 240D Naturally Exasperated, 4-Spd 388k DD 150mph spedo 3:58 Diff

We are advised to NOT judge ALL Muslims by the actions of a few lunatics, but we are encouraged to judge ALL gun owners by the actions of a few lunatics. Funny how that works

117,000 MILES

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John
1986 300sdl
1985 380se

The best I ever got was 8 years and it was a Delco Freedom battery.

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DJ


84 300D Turbodiesel 190K with 4 speed manual sold in 03/2012

The white MB logo batteries sold by dealers are made by Varta, not Bosch.

Sixto
87 300D

varta also makes batteries for wrist watches

I have a black cased Bosch in the 300D. I don't know where it originally came from. It was a brand new battery that was in another Mercedes that I bought a few years back.
I'm curious to see how long it will last. I think it's about 4 years old now.

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DJ


84 300D Turbodiesel 190K with 4 speed manual sold in 03/2012

I have charged it up a few times over the years, added some distilled water also, just routine battery maintenance.
I guess there are just not many electronic items in this car to drain the battery while it sits in the garage. Now my 07 BMW 530i has to be on a trickle charger when it is parked for more than one week at a time. If not, my voltage will go from 12.7 down to 11.6 in a weeks time. BMW has a lot of issues with their batteries.

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John
1986 300sdl
1985 380se

How did you determine the age of the battery? What did the date code on the side say? A battery with a date code ending in 3 is much more likely to be 2003 than 1993. Normal battery life is 3-4 years, 16 years is unlikely.

I agree, but if a battery is properly maintained, and a vehicle is stored mostly in a garage through the cold months, I've seen batteries last 10+ but these days, the maintainance free batteries I never expect to last more than 3-4 years.

a GOOD replacement for the batteries is the same batteries in the 04-current Chargers. it's the SAME battery, I'm not sure who makes them but there are alot of parts in those cars bade by Bosch and Behr and lots of (K) logos and VDO. Sizeable chance the batter is Bosch.
I'll look next time one of the police cruisers is in the shop and see if it's Bosch or not.

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RIP: 80 300SD
RIP: 79 450SEL
2002 E430 4matic (212,000km)
2002 ML500 'sport'

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FACEBOOK: PANZER450

Brandlj,

Have always had good service from interstate batteries.

Let us know which battery you chose.

if accurate. I'm highly (though respectfully) doubtful.

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2009 E320 Bluetec 117,000
1995 E300D 306,000 Sold
1996 Ford Taurus LX 130,000 Sold
1985 300TD Still 225,000 Sold
2016 Ford Fusion 24,900

But it sounds like you don't have a Pep Boys near you?

I've read good things about Interstate, although I had trouble finding a reseller in my area that stocked the big international size battery so I went with a Die Hard.

Batteries last a whole lot longer in the cold than they do the heat. Heat is the biggest killer of batteries. Alot of times batteries are junked when they are still in fact good. The plates become sulfated and no longer take a proper charge. This is especially true on deep cycle batteries.


Heres a question for everyone here. DOES ANYONE ON HERE OWN A HYDROMETER? LET ALONE KNOW HOW TO USE IT? a good hydrometer will tell you a lot about a battery. the battery on my motorcycle would not take a charge due to sulfation. this was caused by improper charging. i had a charging system problem,and i was forced to keep the battery on the battery tender, often charging it from dead. the battery would no longer hold a good charge.

Heres how I fixed it.

Batteries from time to time need to be "cooked" . No I dont mean melt the case or even get the battery hot for that matter. They need a heavy charge, but in doing so, they have to be kept cool. A motorcycle battery would normally melt down when charged at 10a for more than a couple hours.

i got out the trusty old 2a/10a MANUAL(does not shut its self off) charger and set it to the 10a setting. i set the battery in a bucket and filled it with cool water, about 2 inches from the top of the battery. i hooked the charger up and let it charge for 24 hours, keeping a close eye on the water level in the battery its self and making sure the water in the bucket stayed cool. at the 24 hour mark i switched it to the 2a charge rate and allowed it to stabilize. that battery is still like a new battery today.

This is the procedure that exide uses on its industrial batteries for their first charge. When I worked for a forklift company we didn't have the space to set them in water, so we kept close watch on the temp. of course, we also did acid adjusts there too.

Sam's club sells a battery charger with a desulfation mode. This hits the battery with large bursts to help break it off the plates.

It is best to own both automatic and manual chargers.


ok, im done

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have no worries.....President Obama swears "If you like your gun, you can keep it