New Battery

Husky said:

Anyone have any expirience with the Optima battery. Just wondering if they are worth the high price?

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Not really, IMHO. I buy based on construction/type, as opposed to particular names. As others have said, there's basically two battery manufacturers. Every brand out there is either one or the other. My favorite for a long time was the DieHard Platinum. It was one of the first broadly-marketed AGM battery. Since most of my vehicles are trucks and Jeeps, the AGM is best-suited to those kinds of applications.

Since they've been discontinued, I've bought AGM from whomever - O'Reilly, Auto Zone, etc.

This is the video that originally piqued my interest in Diehard Platinum...

Husky said:

Anyone have any expirience with the Optima battery. Just wondering if they are worth the high price?

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I ran Optima batteries since they were introduced. They’re an example of military grade technology that made it to the mainstream. Something happened when Johnson Control purchased them and moved the plants to Mexico. Quality went down the tube.

I ran red, blue and yellow top batteries and ran into issues where the battery would not come back to life after being run flat. I purchased their charger and it is a work of art for resurrecting their dead batteries as well as other AGM batteries. The long and short of things is that I could only get 2-3 years from any of their batteries. When they went out like clockwork, I switched from spiral cell to AGM. It’s been four years and I’ve not looked back.


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Always liked diehard but with advance auto selling them idk if manufacturing is different or not. However I’ve heard good from deka batteries.

Red top optima, never let me down.

Choices may be easier than you think. There are only 3 manufactures of flooded batteries and 4 manufactures of AGM batteries. So all these batteries are made in the same place with 1000 brand stickers.

Husky said:

About time for a new battery. Just trying to get an idea what your expirience is for a good replacement. I'm sure if I ask 20 people I will have 20 different opinions but is there any one battery that most lean towards. With all the electronics these things have they put a higher than most demand on batteries especially in cold weather. Any tips greatly appreciated

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I have a 7 yr old Optima redtop in my daily driver FJ Cruiser. It was one yr old when I installed it Oct of 2014. I've put 80k miles on the FJ since then. The first yr of this redtops life was spent being tortured in my drag car(no alternator) being discharged, then recharged(battery charger), over and over again. Great battery. Not much cold wx where we live.

If you have a costco membership, they have fantastic deals on batteries.
I have been running costco batteries for years now.
They also have a fantastic warranty!

I misdiagnosed a starter going out as a bad battery after changing the cables for some welding cable (with crimped and soldered connectors).
No questions asked, new battery within a few minutes!

That gave me a few extra years on that purchase...

After my 2nd AC Delco failed in less than 4 years total I really looked into batteries and purchased the Bosch Platinum AGM from Pep Boys. 4 year warranty, great CCA rating and they often offer them on sale. Couldn't be happier with the experience.

I have ran Optima batteries for years. Yellow top in my 1st gen Esky and now a Red top in my '08 Burb.

The first Red top I bought for it was a "used" battery from Advance auto parts.

If an Optima sits on their shelf for over a year they can no longer sell it as a new battery. A buddy of mine is the commercial parts manager and he marked it down for me. I think I paid like $80 for it. It lasted me about 5 years here in the miserable Florida heat on a battery that was already over a year old.

When I went to replace it they didn't have any "used" Optimas available so I bought a new Red top at full price, minus my discount of course.

Even the first Red top that I replaced was still cranking the Suburban with only like 212 cranking amps when they tested the battery... lol but it was cranking kinda slow.

My 2 bits... Optima isn't the be all end all, but I have had good luck with them.