[JSH]

Yesterday, my AntiGravity cruises at +/-12.60 and 15.00 at WOT

[JamesNoBrakes]

Originally Posted by Need4Camaro

Just wondering, does this prolong alternator life? and does it hurt battery life?

Volts is pressure, you need pressure to put more electrons back into the battery (electrons don't really flow like water, but for the understanding of everything else, it works to assume they do).

There's a certain amount of amps your battery and alternator are rated for. Amps is the number of electrons. Your battery can supply x amount of amps for an hour, your alternator supplies x amount of amps, etc. So as you use equipment, you use amps. It's all "12v" equipment for the sake of the car's voltage bus, but as you tack on more and more equipment or turn on more and more things, you use more amps. The battery is there to provide ballast for the system while the alternator is running, such as an instantaneous demand that exceeds the alternator's rated amps. Both the alternator and the battery are connected to the ground, which is the frame of the car, this is where the electrons "flow" and they come into each component and then are wired back on the positive to the battery and alternator. So it's normal for there to be some give and take with the alternator and battery even before trying to gain some efficiency. It's also not really true that the alternator "powers" the electrical on the car once started, both the battery and alternator ground to the frame and are both really required for a fully functional system. Without a battery, you can collapse the field current of the alternator relatively easily by spiking power demand. Yes, people have been able to start and drive cars without batteries, but there's an inherent danger for the electrical system. The field current energizes the electromagnets that create the power in the alternator. If amps exceeds what can be output (without a battery), the entire system goes dark. There's going to be an alternator control unit that meters and controls the field current to control the alternator output to satisfy what is necessary to power the system and charge the battery.

As stated before, it's not really efficient to run the alternator at full tilt all the time, also for the purpose of exercising the battery for battery life, so there's a bit of efficiency to be gained here. But more than that, it's totally normal for alternator output to vary, you simply may not need to be charging the battery at the time. Mainly, you should watch for negative/discharge below 12 volts. That would be a warning flag, although I don't know how long you could notice that before you'd have an actual problem.

I had an electrical system problem on my BMW that required changing the rear ECU (screw that kind of failure if it wasn't under warranty!) and there were some residual gremlins I had to get out by going out and driving it pretty hard for a while to get the battery charged back up. Due to the way the system charges though, normal/short drives wasn't going to do it, but once charged, no more issues.

[Rock-It Man]

Originally Posted by ctrlz

So, yeah, new battery does not necessarily mean fully charged. I put my new battery in last week or so and, even though it started the car, I decided to top it off with a charger. Took about 16 hrs to get to full.

Without being pushy, I would suggest you hold off on installing that alternator and invest in a decent charger. Installing the alternator is much more of a pain than charging the battery and I bet your battery just needs to be topped off. return the alternator and even if you have to pay shipping it will be a wash. As the many charger/tender/battery threads hear can attest, your money for a good charger will not be wasted.

Also, I suspect many of your initial problems were due to a crap battery. Bad cell, intermittently bad cell, etc. That's enough to mess with the Camaro's brain.

This is good advice. Hook up a battery tender to the new battery. (Actually, use the terminals under the hood for convenience.) The battery tender will tell you when the battery is fully charged. At that point, when you go for a drive, the charging voltage should drop to 12.5 volts within just a few miles.

[dmcmahan60]

Update, Installed new alternator and do not reccomend:( My arms look like I got into a fight and lost. Per the guage in the car it was still way past 14 volts so I wenr by my local Auto Zone where I got the new battery replaced under warranty last week to have them test the battery again.
Comes back as a bad battery so they gave me a new one and I installed it in the parking lot. Crank the car and goes looks like it is well under 14 volts then after about 30 seconds it jumps up past 14 volts again. So I ask them to test the battery I just replace and it comes back good out of the car? So checking the battery from the jump points under the hood give a false bad battery reading.
Both batteries I did put on a charger and they were both under 90% so I let them fully charge. I plugged a hand held scanner and read the live data to see that the voltage was reading 13.7 volts and the drive in this morning it never went over 13.9 and would sometimes drop to 12. So the gauage in the car is crap but I will see how it goes.
Please don't give me the I told you so scenario because maybe I just put too much thinkimg into it and I am old school in my thought proccess. Thanks to all that tried to help. Good day.

[indyz]

I haven't read your other posts.
Mine regularly hangs out at 14v because most of my drives are extremely short (a few miles).
I try and take it on longer drives when I can (once a month?) and only then do I see it dropping below 14 to the 12-13 range.

My battery is the original factory installed one (2016).
HTHs.

Edit: I've started using a battery tender recently, once a week or two, and that has really helped with hesitant starts.
I also bought a supercapacitor booster since I don't want to get stranded after I drive a few miles.... Battery is really old now

[oldman]

I'll put in my two cents, I have had slow crank on the car for almost a decade. I did roast at least one starter when I was running long tubes in Texas. That aside, after a decade and three alternators, 4 batteries (maybe 5), several ground wires from engine to chassis, three voltage clamps (located on ground wire from batter to chassis), I've come to the conclusion to save $5 on gas GM just cursed the car to undercharge the battery PERIOD. My last dance was changing the current clamp (have to buy the cable with clamp on 6th gen), even though I have just used the one off my kid's CTS which can be ordered separately. That worked for about a year, then died and the car will just undercharge the battery PERIOD. For about 6 months I could drive around with the defroster on (force the system into charge mode), but that has now failed, and the entire system is back to having a mind of its own a that is undercharging the battery PERIOD.

So long story short I have to plug my car into a trickle charger as I can NEVER be sure if the charging system will decide if it wants to maybe it will charge my battery... maybe if the moon is blue and I throw salt over my shoulder. I can go weeks with everything is fine and then the whole system decides to say at 12.5 volts or so and it does drain the battery, and the car will crank slower and slower. I have always made it home but sometimes it was really fingers cross.

I order a voltage clamp for a CTS and will put it on today. Highly doubt it will do anything. My Camaro is a very early production; GM may have a BCM flash for this... But hey I probably saved $5 on gas over the decade thanks GM!

Last tip is NEVER add a ground wire from battery to chassis as this will confuse the current clamp and you have doomed yourself. Some people say never add any grounding wires PERIOD.

Other than that I don't think I have any stock OEM related problems, pretty good for a decade.

[indyz]

My update:


I got a solar based trickle charger.
Battery is always charged now. I drive about 10 miles a week.
No hesitation whatsoever while starting.


Still the original battery (built in 2015) on my 2016 SS

[bishopts]

Originally Posted by oldman

I'll put in my two cents, I have had slow crank on the car for almost a decade. I did roast at least one starter when I was running long tubes in Texas. That aside, after a decade and three alternators, 4 batteries (maybe 5), several ground wires from engine to chassis, three voltage clamps (located on ground wire from batter to chassis), I've come to the conclusion to save $5 on gas GM just cursed the car to undercharge the battery PERIOD. My last dance was changing the current clamp (have to buy the cable with clamp on 6th gen), even though I have just used the one off my kid's CTS which can be ordered separately. That worked for about a year, then died and the car will just undercharge the battery PERIOD. For about 6 months I could drive around with the defroster on (force the system into charge mode), but that has now failed, and the entire system is back to having a mind of its own a that is undercharging the battery PERIOD.

So long story short I have to plug my car into a trickle charger as I can NEVER be sure if the charging system will decide if it wants to maybe it will charge my battery... maybe if the moon is blue and I throw salt over my shoulder. I can go weeks with everything is fine and then the whole system decides to say at 12.5 volts or so and it does drain the battery, and the car will crank slower and slower. I have always made it home but sometimes it was really fingers cross.

I order a voltage clamp for a CTS and will put it on today. Highly doubt it will do anything. My Camaro is a very early production; GM may have a BCM flash for this... But hey I probably saved $5 on gas over the decade thanks GM!

Last tip is NEVER add a ground wire from battery to chassis as this will confuse the current clamp and you have doomed yourself. Some people say never add any grounding wires PERIOD.

Other than that I don't think I have any stock OEM related problems, pretty good for a decade.

You seem to be like my dad. Work on things until it's broken instead of fixing things when they actually are a problem.
Out of all of the batteries, alternators, wires, amp clamps. How many times did it ever NOT start? Exclude slow cranking. Just flat out would not start.

[Alan47717]

Originally Posted by indyz

My update:


I got a solar based trickle charger.
Battery is always charged now. I drive about 10 miles a week.
No hesitation whatsoever while starting.


Still the original battery (built in 2015) on my 2016 SS

Wow, 10 years on an OEM battery, and in a hot climate. My last five new cars the OEM battery went within a few months of their 5th birthday. I know people out here in AZ who consider battery replacement at three years to be routine maintenance.

[indyz]

Originally Posted by Alan47717

Wow, 10 years on an OEM battery, and in a hot climate. My last five new cars the OEM battery went within a few months of their 5th birthday. I know people out here in AZ who consider battery replacement at three years to be routine maintenance.

Either I'm lucky or its all the trickle charging I've been doing, for the past few years.....
I dont put the camaro in the garage anymore, so a solar trickle charger/maintainer has been ideal.

[oldman]

So I just put the generic Amazon special current clamp in ziptied it so the loop is kinda parallel to the cable. Drove it a few miles and the volts stayed above 14 which is expected for a battery at 75% charge. I thought I got an OEM battery cable current clamp last year but who knows there are so many knockoffs. I probably EBay one from a junk yard that way I know it is OEM. Don't have high hopes either way. But I did save $5 on gas over the last decase... maybe.

[bishopts]

Originally Posted by oldman

So I just put the generic Amazon special current clamp in ziptied it so the loop is kinda parallel to the cable. Drove it a few miles and the volts stayed above 14 which is expected for a battery at 75% charge. I thought I got an OEM battery cable current clamp last year but who knows there are so many knockoffs. I probably EBay one from a junk yard that way I know it is OEM. Don't have high hopes either way. But I did save $5 on gas over the last decase... maybe.

Besides staring at your volt meter and not seeing what you want to see. Has your car ever not started?

[arpad_m]

Originally Posted by oldman

So I just put the generic Amazon special current clamp in ziptied it so the loop is kinda parallel to the cable. Drove it a few miles and the volts stayed above 14 which is expected for a battery at 75% charge. I thought I got an OEM battery cable current clamp last year but who knows there are so many knockoffs. I probably EBay one from a junk yard that way I know it is OEM. Don't have high hopes either way. But I did save $5 on gas over the last decase... maybe.

That 14 to 14.5 V is the charging voltage the alternator is using, it isn't the battery voltage. Once the alternator is done, and indeed it'll take its sweet old time to juice up the battery, the gauge displays the actual battery voltage, which should be between 12.5 and 12.7 V.

I never had these issues, cold starts have been peppy and stable since 2018, only hot restarts are slower and stressing the starter, somewhat less after installing a ground strap in the engine bay.

Even then, the car has never failed to start, so I don't obsess over this much. The starter probably still gets heat soaked, and I don't blame it, I have long tube headers and a beefy supercharger in there.

[DaveC113]

@oldman is right, the cars don't keep the battery charged to save on gas and this goes for every manufacturer.

A friend recently bought a Nissan pickup a few years old and there's a simple inductor in the charging circuit that can be eliminated and results in the car charging the battery as you'd expect, and likely extending battery life by several times.

In the Camaro you can turn on the headlights and it'll charge, but you can also use a charger. My battery was replaced under warranty just before the 3-year warranty ran out, now I charge the battery every once in a while and the battery is about 5 years old with no issues. I charge it before any event I go to and in the winter at least once a month.