[Bill Meyer]

After having a dead battery in the third round of elims on Sat, I added up the amps being drawn by all my electrical stuff and came up with 73! (two fans, two fuel pumps, water pump, tranny brake, MSD, etc.) This of course made life tough for my 37 amp alternator and battery.
It's time to upgrade. I ordered a 110 amp alternator, but would like to know if anyone has had experience with those "optima" style batteries . Good or Bad ????? Thx, Bill

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GT37

[Robert Williams]

Bill, glad you got rid of the problem, but when you do need a battery go with the optima. I had a new red top in the box for 10 months before i used it. I took it out of the box, installed it in the car and the car started right up. Also no battery acid spill with the optima. They have a jell inside rather than acid. Will, optima has a battery hold down kit for the batterys they make. Try these sites. http://www.optimabatteries.com http://www.batterystuff.com

[ May 25, 2002, 11:22 PM: Message edited by: Robert Williams ]

[Bill Meyer]

After having a dead battery in the third round of elims on Sat, I added up the amps being drawn by all my electrical stuff and came up with 73! (two fans, two fuel pumps, water pump, tranny brake, MSD, etc.) This of course made life tough for my 37 amp alternator and battery.
It's time to upgrade. I ordered a 110 amp alternator, but would like to know if anyone has had experience with those "optima" style batteries . Good or Bad ????? Thx, Bill

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GT37

[WDCreech]

Craig, the deep cycle is made to have the charge run down before it is recharged. I had a friend that run one in his race car with an alternator and the battery went south after a very short time. I run an Optima red top in my car without an alternator, but with a magnito ignition, and only charge the battery after about every three or four passes. I don't think I would use a deep cycle, even without an alternator.

[fasteddy]

Bill, I use the red top Optima in my race car. I am on the third race season with no juice problems. I run a stock 75 amp alt. with a large pulley. The charge does not come in until about 4000 rpm. Optimas are a real good choice the red tops are cheaper than the yellow deep cycles. Some guys run two in parallel. Good luck Bill, Eddy.

[Goatman]

I run the red and I don't even charge it all winter and it still fires the car. I also use one in my trailer during the summer and then it goes into my Blazer plow truck in the winter. Never had to charge either of them. I'll never buy another kind of battery for a car I'll keep.

[Poncho64]

I used to manage an advance auto parts store here in south carolina and advance sells a brand of spiral cell called vortex, now if you go an look at the battery it looks just like and optima, look on top of the battery and you will see that it is, Advance buys them from optima and sells them under the champion name. They are the red ones not the yellow deep cycles but they are cheaper and you get a 3 year free replacement warranty for them so thats the best bet, I have one in everything I own from my 64 lemans 389 to my chevrolet 454 1 ton. They sell for about 124.00

[Tom Vaught]

We ran the Optima battery in the 600 hp Mustang
with the supercharger and never had any issues in
4 years. The jelly batterys are much better for acceleration forces on the plates vs a liquid style battery. If you install a liquid style battery incorrectly in a trunk location the force
of acceleration acting on the liquid will force the plate cells to contact and ruin the battery.
Tom V.

[Will]

The only problem I have with my Optima battery is that it is a smaller size than what's supposed to be in my Formula and the factory battery hold down doesn't fit it well. I've come up with a workaround though - went to an industrial supply recycling center and bought a slab of hard rubber that's just over an inch thick and put that in the bottom of my battery tray. Now the batter sits up high enough that the hold down can clamp it.

Awesome batteries. A fully charged red top can power a 180 watt car stereo almost an entire night.

-Will

[ddouble]

I run an Advance store and we've had good luck with the red and yellow top Optima batteries. We also sell some blues (near the beach). Have less problems with spirals than all others. Mud trucks, go fast turn left cars, straight liners, mondo stereo cars. They work well in them all. They do weigh more but the reliablity is great.

[ May 26, 2002, 11:13 PM: Message edited by: Dan&Dot ]

[Bill Meyer]

Thanks for your informative replies on the batteries!!! Good news update: After putting in the 110 amp alternator, I ran this past weekend and kept both my fans and water pump on between rounds and had 13+ volts the whole day! CSI controller turns everything off @ 136 degrees. The existing battery (1100) just needed a good alternator to keep it going. It was from Summit (East Side Auto) and sold for $199. Perfect bolt-in to stock setup.Highly recommended!!! Thx, Bill

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GT37

[Robert Williams]

I had a Sears Die Hard in my 76 T/A, and it weighed 42 lbs. The Optima Red Top weighs 40 lbs, 2 lbs lighter than the Die Hard. The yellow top may weigh more i don't know.

[ May 27, 2002, 06:50 PM: Message edited by: Robert Williams ]

[Craig Berkheimer]

So, is anyone else using an Optima?

Does anyone use the Yellow deep cycle?

How do you like them?

[Herb Hagan]

I use the Optima deep cycle and recommend it. I had issues this past weekend down at Ocean City that would have killed a normal battery. I run Electric water pump, fan and fuel pump. This all with the lites on Friday nite with no charging system function drained the battery to below 11 volts and it still started without a jumpstart.

Herb

[Half-Inch Stud]

I would like to get an Optima battery. Sounds pretty cool. But my small-case, trunk-mounted Delco Freedom battery is still working since I installed it in 1991. Geez, can't this battery just die already!!!

H.I. Stud