My original VARTA battery from March 2014 (manufactured code 11/14) died suddenly on Thursday last week. It's been maintained on a CTEK whenever the car is garaged and six years isn't too bad. Interesting that it didn't deteriorate gradually but the failure was from one day to the next.

My Jaguar Dealer gives me 20% discount on batteries. They are always less than three months old and come fully charged so I don't bother going elsewhere. However, following the Covid-19 lockdown both at UK Dealers and the Factory, they didn't have a battery, no other dealer in the north of England had a battery, the JLR distribution centre in Frankfurt, Germany don't have batteries available and there's at least a FOUR WEEK delay on delivery to them from the OE manufacturer - VARTA in Germany.

Alternative brands were available locally but none of the premium ones. I managed to source a VARTA battery 150 miles away in North Wales and it was delivered overnight. The same supplier had 90aH and 100aH VARTA and the equivalent BOSCH available. 90aH is the OE specification but I went for the 100aH.

The experience allowed me to discover from the Dealer the answer to the "wet"/AGM battery question which has intrigued me for some time. As we have discovered on the forum, X150's can have either fitted by the factory and this is apparently due to availability rather than any technical necessity. Only Stop/Start Jaguars REQUIRE an AGM battery. Others can use EITHER. My research also revealed that VARTA and BOSCH batteries are produced in the same factory.

The easy way to avoid any BMS (Battery Monitoring System) or other calibration issues seemed to be simply to leave my CTEK connected during the battery switch. The only necessary precautions being ignition OFF, ensuring the terminals did not touch and the positive did not ground. It worked successfully and the only thing requiring a reset was the clock.

Graham

 

What is a "stop/start Jaguar?"

 

The engine switches off when the vehicle comes to a stop at traffic lights etc. It then starts again when the accelerator is pressed. All designed to reduce emissions, fuel consumption and save the Planet. Our F-Type owning members really love that feature and usually disable it immediately.

Graham

 

Thank you Graham. This has come up several times for discussion regarding the attached TSB. There was never any rationale listed in the TSB so the running assumption has been the "alternator" was different. Thanks for the clarity!

 

Thanks! That makes perfect sense.
I've got a convertible, and I'm in LA, the land of stop/start traffic.... when the top's down, and I'm at a stoplight, I'd say i hear at least 5 or six engine start-ups when the light turns green. It's a very odd experience. And I always wonder: don't these starting motors burn out?

 

Here's the Intelligent Stop/Start description from the 2013 F-Type Owner's Handbook. I thought the system strange when I first encountered it on an XF courtesy car from my dealer and it was one of the factors that decided me against changing my XK for an F-Type.




Vehicles with Intelligent Stop/Start are fitted with an AGM battery.

Graham

 

Hello Graham I use Battery Megastore, they useually get to you the next day
www.batterymegastore.co.uk
Hope that helps

 

I have the branded Jaguar ctek which uses a cigar lighter type fitting in the boot/trunk. So should I just leave that in with ctek powered on if I need to change battery?

 

Interesting, I never heard of a battery failing suddenly.

My personal opinion is that keeping charger connected during battery swap is dangerous. My rationale - if anything goes wrong as you reconnecting the new battery there is one extra path for current to flow.