I am pretty sure one of two things are toast: My battery or my alternator. Or both. Got a 96 hour permit for my car yesterday and it ran like a champ for most of the day. I noticed after making a prolonged stop that my voltage dropped a bit and it took a few tries to start, but it has never done that before. The battery is less than two years old, but it sat out of the car for a good 8-9 months. Alternator has always worked, but I'm afraid painting it might have messed up with the conductivity of the coils.

It was just weird that this hasn't happened until last night. I wondered if it was maybe the security system out of whack, but again it has never given me problems before. When I tried to start, the only things that light up were the shift up alert, all the idiot warning lights, and that's it. Anything electrical related was either really dim or really slow moving. Even the headlights took forever to come up. The voltage gauge only went up like 1mm when I turned the key to the on position, and when I tried starting all I heard was a click and nothing else.

Any insight to this? I'll stop and get a new battery as well as my other alternator and try again. This sucks.

 

new battery new alternator. then do a overhaul on your ground system. 7's are prone to bad grounds. run a ground kit or make one your self.

 

Take your battery to a vatozone and get it tested. If you want you can take your alt to get tested too. Old parts get old.

 

I cleaned all my grounds during my 87-88 swap, so those should be fine. Took a grinding wheel to all the connections to clean them.

Edit: Did some reading on the s4 factory alarm thread, and I think I will try to jumper the starter cut relay, but if it is supposed to crank even if the security says no start, then that will point out that isnt my problem.

 

your battery is toast.

 

Yep, thought so. Going for a replacement after school. What a waste of an optima. I wish I could easily get a braille and relocate it to the passenger compartment. Luckily it is still under warranty.

 

Check the battery for sure at autozone. Also get the alternator checked. I had my voltage dip when i was at stops and it was the voltage regulator that went out in the alternator, thus i had to get a new one.

Also, check the alternator belt. it could be loose or ripped.

 

..and if that Braille was bad you would have got Squat out of the cranking time.
Remember the smaller the battery,the less cranking amps you are going to have.
The ONLY time I would consider a Braille battery is IF the car was a First Crank/Starts every time Kind of car...If the car takes a long time to Crank,forget about a Small battery..It may look good but won't do the job.
Now,an Optima in the passenger bin,ya.

 

It depends which Braille battery you choose. I think quite a few people run Braille batteries with no issues. The Optima red top is a good battery. It's a sealed no-spill battery... So it doesn't need ventilation. Why not relocate that?

Ever since you swapped everything into this GXL you've had quite a few different issues. I am glad to hear that you have it running.

 

I just had the exact same issue. Mine was solved with a bigger battery but since you have an Optima, crank amps wouldn't be your problem. The electrical on some of these cars is such a nuisance