Portable Battery Jumpers

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Bruise Lee

Joined
Aug 4, 2002
Messages
363
I've been thinking about buying one of those portable battery jumping units (or whatever they are called) for my car. These seem to be self contained (12 volt) batteries with jumper cables attached you can store in your trunk so you can jump start your battery if the need arises. Some have a built in light, and a cigarette lighter outlet to plug in accessories like your cell phone or whatever.

My questions are: how powerful are these units? Can they be depended on to start a large V-8 in the winter? Any idea how many cold cranking amps they can supply?

How long can these units hold a charge before they themselves have to be recharged?

How safe are these units? I'm mainly concerned with leaking battery acid, and the chance of them exploding if you get the polarity wrong when you do the jump. No, I am not that stupid, but I did give my co-worker a jump once, and he connected the negative to the positive. He was rewarded with a battery that literally exploded and hit by pieces of plastic from the battery casing. Also, since these are sealed units, I'm curious how they deal with out gassing.

Any brand recommendations, or brands we should steer away from?

Bruise
 
I've got one of the self contained battery jumper thingies that Prestone makes. Bought mine from Advance Auto...went in and asked them about which one they would recommend and they had high praise for the Prestone. It seems to hold charge for a long time, though, periodically you will need to plug it in to keep the battery in top condition. Knock on wood, I haven't had to use it yet, but it's extra insurance that I won't get stranded because of a dead battery when I'm out of town. On the back of the unit, there is a big sticker with jumping instructions. also handy is a built in spotlight to assist in tire changes. It's not that bright but will work in an emergency situation like that. The battery is entirely self contained so there is no danger of acid leaking.
 
Some of the jumper systems have reverse polarity protection, many do not. Lead acid batteries of all kinds can explode or suffer irreparable damage from shorts and reversed polarity.

The jumper cables I carry came from maybe the Safety Company (???), no longer around I think. Then the wife found another set at a garage sale for $3!!! These cables are in 2 halves. Each half has the traditional red and black big old clamps on one end, and on the other end there is a big polarized plug and socket with an LED. It does not matter if teh plug or socket bearing half is on teh live car. To use, the jumper cable is unplugged from itself, and the clamps end is connected to the battery in each car. If either battery is either connected backwards or totally dead, the LED in the big plug and socket will not light. Check the battery connections. If both LEDs light, it is safe to connect the cable back together and you have a good connection.

For my car, I installed a LVD, low voltage disconnect. No more dead batteries, which the kids used to inflict on me almost weekly. We got the Priority Start because it does not require getting under the hood to hit a reset button, it senses a change in resistance, like stepping on the brake pedal or turning on or off the headlights, and automatically reconnects the battery for starting the car.
 
I thought about getting one of those jump starters also, but they cost about as much as a new battery for my car and probably has a service life not much longer. I came to the conclusion that for the money and the time/hassle of keeping a jump starter charged, properly stowed and maintained, I would be better off just keeping my car's battery properly maintained and replaced at the correct interval.

For the money of a jumpstarter, I would also highly recommend the "Priority Start" device as previously mentioned. My car has something similar built-in and that along with reasonable maintenance will eliminate any problems that a jumpstarter can solve. I just don't need one more device in my life that requires looking after and that will probably become useless in a few years, just when you might need it.
 
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