potat5656

Hey Guys-New to the forum and I can only attribute that to the fact that my 2005 Honda Accord Ex (4 cyl) has been so reliable!

Until now...

At 61,000 miles I hop in the car and all of a sudden the A/C does not work, gear indicator light don't display which gear the car is in & the ambient air temperature read out shows "---F" instead of the temperature.

Steps I have taken:
1) Checked every fuse thoroughly (none were burnt out)
2) Hooked up OBD sensor and no error codes are shown...
3) Smacked the heck out of the dash


Any suggestions? (Even tips on how to search for similar problems/troubleshoots would be useful!) Thanks in advance, Christian

fleabag

Get a battery charger and charge that sucker. If you're desperate, take the battery to autozone and have them charge the battery for free. If charging the battery 'miraculously' solves your problem, then I suggest getting a battery charger that can desulfate the battery otherwise you'll have to replace the battery.

If you use something like this:http://www.amazon.com/BatteryMINDer-Charger-Maintainer-Desulfator-Model/dp/B000P23HZS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1312328956&sr=8-1
which is a battery charger that can desulfate batteries (but is mostly intended as a battery maintainer which means slow rate of charge) I suggest using a normal battery charger like from autozone or a friend, charge the battery to full then use this maintainer to desulfate the battery. It shouldn't take more than 2 weeks to desulfate the battery. The benefit of doing this instead of buying a new battery is that a new battery costs $80+ while a charger is less than that and can easily double the life of your battery which means that it will pay for itself if it can save a single battery.

Charging the battery for free will temporarily alleviate your problems with the battery but only temporarily which I why I suggest desulfating the battery.

BLKFLSH

I was having some similar problems (Park light in the dash would be out when I started the car, and the A/C would not work right. Turns out I had a weak battery. It was hard to believe because the battery was still strong enough to start the engine. Problem was, starting the engine took so much of the battery's power, that it was causing communication errors with the MICU (Multiplex Integrated Control Unit), which is part of the under dash fuse box. If you were to short the connector on the MICU, I bet you would have some codes stored there. The MICU displays error codes in the dash odometer display. It's a complicated process, so I could never explain it to you here. I have the factory service manual, and it still took me a while to figure it out. So, I suggest having your battery tested under load. The Honda manual recomends testing the system with a "Bear" tester, just so happens Autozone had that particular brand of tester.

fleabag

Part of the reason I suggested the whole battery thing is that while it only takes 10.5v to crank an engine, car electronics tend to not work well, depending on the car, when the battery's resting voltages gets below like 11.8v. I've seen this on at least two newer cars and it appears Honda's newer cars aren't spared from this. I keep emphasizing getting a good charger and saving that battery because you can usually save the battery and use that charger again sometime later instead of spending dough on a battery now. A good charger can double the working life of a battery.

BLKFLSH

I don't have a charger, but you have me thinking about getting one. What type would be good, and you know I have to ask, how much do they cost. I've never charged batteries, I just replace them. If I can make my battery last 7 years, instead of just 3 or 4, a charger sounds like a good idea. I know nothing about when to charge a battery, or test one, other than holding the probes of a multimeter on it.

fleabag

Well this is 'suppose' to be the best battery charger out there:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...A2U296R8AN80PO
comes with a 5 year warranty!

Primary reason why I'm going to buy this one is that it will continuously desulfate the battery and you're not suppose to worry about overcharging your battery with this smart charger. There are other chargers with a battery desulfate function but they'll only do it in 18 hour increments.

I was also considering this charger:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...=AR8XJJ19SNPNX
and only use it after doing the initial charge with my current 3 stage 'smart charger'. You can charge batteries with this charger but if the battery is too depleted, it's not recommended as it apparently can burn out the charger.

My biggest issue with the chargers above is that they do not have an equalization function which I find to be useful and so when I want to equalize my batteries, I have to manually heat up the affected cell then quickly throw on the battery charger and carefully watch to make sure the battery temperature doesn't exceed the safe limit of around 120F. I e-mailed the company about a lack of an equalization function and he gave me his own testimony on how in practice, he didn't need it despite using an 8 year old battery. I don't know, maybe he is right and that maybe the need for equalization is a byproduct of a sulfated battery perhaps.

Kev2010

You should just get a new battery.

fleabag

Yes, spend another $50-$100 on a battery to only have it fail in the next 4 years.. Smart move!