Battery and Voltage

[Travis]

I have a 2011 LR4 with 86,000 miles. I had to replace the Interstate battery and original alternator about 9 months ago. At the time everything seemed to go smoothly. I had the alternator rebuilt, and I replaced the 3 year old Interstate battery with an Interstate AGM (MT5-94R H7).

Was I supposed to use an OBD tool (such as Gap) or bring it to the dealership to have the "battery type" updated or something? I didn't do this. Like I said, at the time the truck started well and I didn't have any issues. But now the battery seems to be dying quickly and doesn't seem to be able to start the vehicle well if the LR4 sits a few days. I have to use a jump pack to get it started. It's on the battery charger now.

Thanks for your replies.

 

[Daniele Gardellin]

If your battery is new and fully charged, the car “maintain” it in from 13.2-13.7V

When the battery isn’t fully charged, the car will charge it at 14.3-14.5V, assuming that you have an AGM battery and your CCF is correctly settled for this type of battery

 

[Daniele Gardellin]

Ah! When you change the battery with a new one, you need to “use a diagnostic” SW to reset the battery status on the BCM and on the BMS

 

[Quijote]

Just replaced my battery and ran the IIDTool process. It was surprisingly quick. New battery read 14.8V when the engine was running.

 

[Travis]

Ah! When you change the battery with a new one, you need to “use a diagnostic” SW to reset the battery status on the BCM and on the BMS

Daniele - could you help me understand this a little better? Should I just take my 2011 LR4 to the dealership and ask them to reset the battery status? What is the BCM and what is the BMS? I am still having the issue with my battery not charging. Not sure if it is the alternator. The new AGM battery I installed about 11 months ago seemed to work fine for the first 9 months, but the last 2 months it doesn't seem to charge. The alternator had to be rebuilt at the same time I replaced the alternator.

 

[DonC]

I found this info on the LR4 facebook group and it help me finally solve the issues I was seeing with the charging on my 11 LR4. I had replaced the alternator and battery last April and would still see voltage drop down to 12.2 while running. Initially I blamed it on a bad new alternator so I returned it and swapped for another new one. The same issue popped up again so I started to look at the battery. The battery was replaced at the same time with a new interstate. After swapping to the second battery a few weeks later it would drop down again to 12.2 while driving. If you have the cool box fitted you know when it goes down as you can hear the fans switch off below 13.3v. Another battery replacement but this time to a AGM and making sure the specs were set properly via the GAP tool I thought I was good to go. Well it started happening again after the last cold spell so I looked further into it.

There was a post from a shop owner on FB about how many electrical issues are misdiagnosed on the LR4 due to the main ground cable being corroded. I assumed it would be in a some what protected location as it is on my D2 but it is not. You have to pull back the right front fender liner right in front of the air bag and there you can see it looking up from under the vehicle. When I removed the dome nut that held the ground cable in place there was quite of bit of road gunk that had built up in that area on the grounding point. I cleaned the connection with a wire brush and a sanding block. Reassembled with dielectric grease and sure enough I now have a constant voltage showing that never drops below 13.5
Just food for thought and you might want to check the ground cable.

 

[Quijote]

I found this info on the LR4 facebook group and it help me finally solve the issues I was seeing with the charging on my 11 LR4. I had replaced with alternator and battery last April and would still see voltage drop down to 12.2 while running. Initially I blamed it on a bad new alternator so I returned it and swapped for another new on. The same issue popped up again so I started to look at the battery. The battery was replaced at the same time with a new interstate. After swapping to the second battery a few weeks later it would drop down again to 12.2 while driving. If you have the cool box fitted you know when it goes down as you can her the fans switch off below 13.3v. Another battery replacement but this time to a AGM and making sure the specs were set properly via the GAP tool I thought I was good to go. Well it started happening again after the last cold spell so I look further into it.

There was a post from a shop owner on FB about how many electrical issues are misdiagnosed on the LR4 due to the main ground cable being corroded. I assumed it would be in a some what protected location as it is on my D2 but it is not. You have to pulled back the right front fender liner right in front of the air bag and there you can see it looking up from under the vehicle. When I removed the dome nut that held the ground cable in place there was quite of bit of road gunk that had built up in that area on the grounding point. I cleaned the connection with a wire brush and a sanding block. Reassembled with dielectric grease and sure enough I now have a constant voltage showing that never drops below 13.5
Just food for thought and you might want to check the ground cable.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing!

 

[mbw]

dielectric grease

Just so we are clear, this grease is non-conductive. It may keep moisture out of a connection/connector, but its maybe not the first thing I would put on my main ground. I could be wrong though.

 

[cperez]

There was a post from a shop owner on FB about how many electrical issues are misdiagnosed on the LR4 due to the main ground cable being corroded.

Chalk up another tidbit for the mythical LR4 wiki...good share @DonC. Which specific LR4 group on FB?

 

[DonC]

Chalk up another tidbit for the mythical LR4 wiki...good share @DonC. Which specific LR4 group on FB?

Steve Rossi post from Aug 3, 2018 on Land Rover Owners North America group.

mbw - I agree. I grabbed what I had handy to just make sure the dome nut had something on it. I am going back into that area for a hidden winch install here in the coming weeks and planning on sealing it better when I do.