My suggestion is to first determine why your car is "hard to start in the
winter". My 3000 sits all winter (in Kansas) without being started. In the
spring it starts after cranking for 5-10 seconds.
I have a trickle charger that I connect to the battery periodically. I measure
the battery voltage & if it dips below about 12.5 volts I attach the trickle
charger. My battery is an Odyssey PC1200 (CCA = 630). According to Odssey 12.5
volts is 75% charged. 12.84 is 100% charged. These are steady state figures,
assuming the battery has not been on the charger for at lease 1 day & has not
recently been used to start the car.
When I hear that a car is hard to start in the winter the first thing I would
check is the proper operation of the choke. Fuel enrichment not fast idle,
depending upon the carbs on your BT7.
Gary Hodson
-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Spidell <bspidell at comcast.net>
To: healeys <healeys at autox.team.net>
Sent: Thu, May 17, 2018 10:00 am
Subject: Re: [Healeys] Cold Cranking Amps
John,
Do you use a battery maintainer? They can help (but AGMs should have one
tuned for them). Have you had your starter rebuilt? The field coils, in
particular, can degrade and reduce the starter output considerably.
Solenoids degrade over time, too.
It doesn't get that cold where you, and I used to, live; you shouldn't
have that much trouble starting your Healey in the winter, even if it's
sat for a couple months. Mine would take 10-15 seconds of cranking in the
winter after sitting to start, as opposed to maybe 5 seconds in warmer
months.
Switching to a lower-viscosity oil, for the winter at least, might help
some too. I use 20W-50 year-round. My experience with the
'boosters'--exactly one--is that they might help a marginal
starter/battery over the top, but will not cold start a completely dead
battery, and least not on a big 6- or 8-cyl engine.
Bob
On 5/16/2018 10:29 PM, John Spaur wrote:
So? I never completely described the issues pertaining to this query.
I have a 3000 BT7 and good 775 CCA battery. My car is hard to start
in the winter, despite being housed in my garage, because I drive
it infrequently. Yes, I know? just drive it more often!
When starting it in the winter, the battery starts to give out, but
not completely (yet) before starting the car. I suspect it is
due to fuel degradation even though I add Stable to the petrol.
I would like to get a portable jump starter for extra starting power
instead of jumping from my daily driver. Been checking the list
recommendations and some have a cranking rating but most do not.
John
From: Healeys [mailto:healeys-bounces at autox.team.net] On
Behalf Of simon.lachlan at alexarevel.plus.com
Sent: Wednesday, May 16, 2018 5:20 AM
To: healeys at autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [Healeys] Cold Cranking Amps
The one thing that noone?s mentioned so far is putting in a
modern starter motor. That won?t clean up the contacts in the
wiring system, but it will certainly make the best use of your amps.
Plainly not to everyone?s taste. Visually not obtrusive, but audibly
a bit off.
Does create space for a bigger oil filter if you?ve got a
conversion that comes straight off the block?..
Simon
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