Battery pulse load tester manuals#
Battery pulse load tester upgrade#

When conducting a battery check using the Cartman Car Battery and Alternator Tester, you simply have to connect the red clamp to the positive terminal and the black clamp to the negative terminal of your battery – with your car turned off. The company’s battery and alternator tester are compact and easy to read, with an LED display that indicates the condition of a 12-volt battery. One of the more affordable options on this list comes from Cartman.

Battery pulse load tester manuals#

We found high-quality pdfs of user manuals as well. There is a toll-free customer service number for Topdon’s New Jersey headquarters and a number of web forms for technical support and warranty issues. The company also offers a loaner tool program if your tool requires repairs under warranty. There is a good two-year limited warranty on Topdon battery testers and a brief three-day money-back guarantee on defective items. Topdon’s other models of battery testers have similar 90%-plus ratings. The BT100 has a great 92% positive rating from over 2,000 reviews, the best weighted average in the category. We would also have liked a case or at least a storage bag with it.

Battery pulse load tester upgrade#

It’s a great battery tester for occasional use, but if we were using one a few times a week, we’d want to upgrade to either a printout or Bluetooth. With short leads, this could be inconvenient for trunk-mounted batteries. Our biggest complaint is that it must be connected to a battery for the display to work. But it was possible and gave us useful information (including that wherever our short is, it’s not in the charging system). The battery health ripple test requires starting the car and holding the RPM at 2,500 for five seconds, which would be a lot easier with two people. We then tried the cranking and charging system health functions in a Mazda with a flat-plate AC Delco Gold battery. Getting a battery health reading was easy. During several rounds of testing, we noticed that the display gets sluggish in colder temperatures. The opening screen shows a small voltage readout at the bottom, and then you have to select your battery technology, in this case, AGM spiral wound, from the following screen. We hooked up a BT100 Car Battery Tester to one of our Optima Yellow Top test batteries (note: you must connect it directly to the posts), and the display came on immediately. You get both a backlit illuminated 128 x 64 LCD readout and green-yellow-red warning lights. It can perform a standard battery health test (shown), cranking, and ripple charging system test.

It works with all major battery technologies: Conventional and enhanced flooded (EFB) AGM flat plate AGM spiral and gel. Topdon’s BT100 is the top-rated product in the category and replaces the former #2 pick AB101 on our list. To learn more about the best car battery testers, refer to our table of contents. Some testers are easier to use than others, while some offer more comprehensive data and other features, such as the ability to test your car’s alternator. Plus, we think they’re fun to use, especially if they have a display, and it’s not hard to learn a little more about things like internal resistance and cranking amps. Just remember that some functions, like cranking, are a lot easier with two people. It’s also a great tool if you’re buying a used car, used battery, or have some lying around your garage. When a good replacement battery can cost hundreds of dollars, it’s a small investment to give you lots of warning if a battery starts to go bad, and gives you a chance to put it on a charger with a repair cycle to buy a few more months, too. Using the best car battery tester, like our Editor’s Pick, can tell you more than just “good or bad.” They can give you a real insight into how your battery charges, cranks your engine, and what it’s internal health is like. You can help make your battery last a lot longer by putting it on a trickle charger if you only use your car a few days a week, or if it’s going to be parked more than a week. It will quickly tell you if your battery is OK or if it needs to be replaced.Ĭar batteries only last so long, usually about 5-8 years, but slow starting doesn’t mean yours is going. There’s only one way to answer the question, “Is it my battery, or something else” when your car won’t start: Hook up the best car battery tester and get a readout of what’s going on.