Odyssey Battery Warning

[Wolf Island Diver]

Well, it started. Did my 10x run cycles to prime the fuel pump, the Renogy showed 12.4V in its monitoring and she started up. Just got to hold out until the new battery comes in.

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[Wolf Island Diver]

They didn’t ship my battery. I spent 3 days calling, left a message and emailed. There’s literally 1 person working in the Odyssey office. Finally on Wednesday she answered and said it didn’t ship. She called the warehouse and got them straight. Finally got it today and installed. I cleared my codes but my flashing glow plug warning which started flashing on startup (goes away after a few seconds)when the battery took a shit won’t go away nor will the check engine light after a tazer code clearing. Everything is working fine otherwise. I also figured out the CHMSL is out from looking through the codes. I’m ordering a Chineseum replacement from Bozomart. I read that rear brake lights being out can cause the glow plug warning on other vehicles, believe it or not. Anyone actually see that on the gladiator? Fuel filter was just changed so that’s not it. I may have to take it in or break down and get a OBDLinkMx+ and Jscan. I don’t think the tazer is going to tell me enough. I hate taking to the dealers in Va. They’re all useless morons. My Jeep dealer won’t even work on the diesels. I have to take it to their Mazda dealer where their diesel mechanics are.

 

[DanW]

Just an FYI to folks. I bought a 94R in December of ‘24. It died quite suddenly a month ago, registering 9V. The truck lives on a NOCO Genius 10 charger, plus I have solar charging from the DCC50S, plus I drive the truck consistently. The Aux is long removed from the truck. Things fail, so that doesn’t really concern me. I can’t pass judgement on the quality of these batteries based on a sample set of 1.

@Odyssey USA ‘s default position is that any battery that has low voltage is not covered under warranty. However, you can call them and they did honor the 3 year warranty since the battery was well maintained (living on a tender/maintainer). The real problem is that they have no batteries in their supply chain until at least mid June. I happened to still have the OEM battery sitting in my garage because I hadn’t gotten around to disposing of it. That’s in the truck now and it’s not in good shape. I’m having all sorts of issues as it’s clearly not long for this world.

The point is, there’s a risk in buying these expensive aftermarket batteries. You may not be able to get a replacement or have to wait a long time if they fail unlike picking one up from Costco, etc. I’m mostly likely going to have to buy a new battery anyway in the meantime and then I’ll have this brand new Odyssey that I have no need for. There’s also a global shortage of AGM batteries, so this risk is worse that it probably was previously.

I would try using an Optima D1200 or equivalent. Chargers like that can sometimes recover a high performance pure lead AGM battery like that. I have an Optima D400, and I think it will do it, too, but I am not sure.

Maybe a store like Batteries + Bulbs has a charger that can do it. I am sure they´d give it a try for you, if they do.

 

[Wolf Island Diver]

I would try using an Optima D1200 or equivalent. Chargers like that can sometimes recover a high performance pure lead AGM battery like that. I have an Optima D400, and I think it will do it, too, but I am not sure.

Maybe a store like Batteries + Bulbs has a charger that can do it. I am sure they´d give it a try for you, if they do.

Already invested in a BatteryMinder. It’s got an Odyssey setting.

 

[Wolf Island Diver]

So the truck is still throwing codes, (ABS, and failed to get a security code blah blah) which are new and the glow plug light still briefly flashes on startup. But I noticed something. My voltage was 12.45 today after sitting off-charger overnight. I’ve read some reviews of the 70mai dash cams drawing a lot of power. Mine is set to turn off after a few hours, but honestly a lot of these Chinese products are spyware or just janky, so who knows if it honors that. I’ve unplugged it and I’m going to check tomorrow to see where I stand. It also could be its 4G module (maybe even more likely. I need to do some consistent testing. One nice thing is that the dash cam actually has a pretty good battery monitor built in with a graph. I can see where things drop. Nothing particularly stands out.

No parasitic load explains a battery dropping to 9V immediately after coming off a charger, so my old battery definitely failed, but having consistent slow drops down into the marginal level of 12V range after one night possibly explains some of these bs module codes and other flakiness. There’s some other things I can check or isolate as well. I’m going to do another reset of the IBS as well when I get around to it. At least my truck now starts enthusiastically and runs fine. I don’t mind leaving it on the minder but I need to get a better idea of what’s drawing power.

 

[Wolf Island Diver]

The saga continues…

I got a fob not detected twice today. The truck had been sitting on the minder for the last few days. However I lost power so maybe that screwed it up.

getting back from my errands and the battery is at 12.6V. Starting the truck, I notice almost no change to the voltage read at the battery. It just slowly crept up slowly to about 12.8. I connected the batteryminder, same thing, and the noco. I tried bypassing the magcode. That’s not it either. After a while on the minder it’s come up to 13.35. I’m not ready to say the alternator isn’t charging the truck yet.

I noticed another thing. With the truck in run (ignition off) voltage continues to drop. This thing draws a lot of power. I removed the Tazer and got my new OBD link MX+ and Jscan going. The only codes are cylinder 5 glow plugs (explains the glow plug warning at startup, and a bunch of stored bs ones (amplifier, backup camera, etc). The former could be from the power loss or odd coincidental failure of the glowplug or wiring. The latter are all from the battery failure since all that stuff works. I cleared everything except two permanent glow plug warnings. I’m gonna see if there’s clear on their own. There are no BCM or charging system codes or really anything else telling.

I’ve got a Bluetooth battery monitor coming tomorrow. I think collecting a lot more data over time is the next step to see if I have some kind of parasitic load and what happening during charging and driving. I don’t really have anything on the truck that stays on except for the dash cam 4g module. That could be it but not when the truck is plugged in. It didn’t occur to me to look at the date on this new battery either. I’ve never had the fob issue outside of a failing battery.

 

[J Sierra]

You can get live data (battery voltage and alternator current), on your phone while driving with Jscan

 

[Wolf Island Diver]

You can get live data (battery voltage and alternator current), on your phone while driving with Jscan

I ordered a BM200 that I can just leave on at night and see what’s happened the next morning. Hopefully BM stands for “Battery Monitor” and not “Bowel Movement”

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