Better Beaters - Building Cars and Daily Drivers

Musical Cars.

Covering or uncovering the Navigator reminds me
 of tenting a house for termites! That's a lot of canvas to move around!

Moving the cars around so that I can gain access to ones that I have parked in the garage. 

Getting the cars out of the garage requires moving the two cars that are parked behind them in the driveway. That's a hassle for the blue Mustang which is parked in the garage in front of the covered Navigator. Taking the car cover off the Nav, is a bit of a hassle in itself. The Riv sits on the left side of the garage, in front of the Flex, which is one of our daily drivers and is usually uncovered. 

Recent problems that my Daughter had experienced with her car's battery has given me concern about my hobby cars. The last time I helped her, I brought my jump box and hooked up a trickle charger connection. I left her the charger and an extension cord. I also left the jump box with her in the Mustang's trunk. Just in case. 

Most of my cars have been sitting for some time. There is a reason for that. I've been concentrating on my Riviera. I can only drive one car at a time.

With each car, I need to drive it to charge up the battery, get the oil nice and hot, circulate the fluid through the transmission, keep the brakes loose, and burn up some of the gas that's starting to get old. In other words I need to put some miles down. 

I tried to start my '96 Mustang after sitting for a couple of months and the battery was dead. 

This battery is going on four years old so it's on the downward spiral.  

I jumped it off my truck to get it started. Before I went to help my daughter I stopped at Harbor Freight and bought a new charger.

Harbor Freight has a good selection of chargers.
I paid for it with a gift card that my kids had given me for my birthday.

Besides a choice of three charging levels, it also has a recondition function. Push the icon bearing the image of the wrench, and the charger will automatically "recondition" the battery. This will help a battery that has started to sulfate from sitting in a discharged state. I suppose that it varies the amperage and the cycles in a way to break up the deposits. I remember that back in the 70's, there were additives that you could add to the battery electrolyte to accomplish the same thing. It's important to avoid letting the battery run down to a discharged state. This will reduce the battery's life span and as I've noted, batteries have gotten to be quite expensive. 

When the charger is hooked up to the battery it will provide a reading of its current voltage. 

I backed the blue Mustang far enough
to clear the table.

I found that I could just back up the Nav to the sidewalk and have enough space to easily access the battery of my blue Mustang. 

Hooked up and ready to go.

The car started up easily, so I hadn't expected the battery to need the recondition function. It wasn't seriously discharged but it was lower than what I would have liked. I hooked up the charger and let it run for a couple of hours.

80% wasn't that bad.

After several hours the battery was up to snuff.

Now it's at full charge.

Then it was the Navigator's turn.

50% is more concerning.

The Navigator's battery was sitting at a lower charge compared to the blue Mustang. I anticipated having the charger hooked up for a longer time. The Navigator battery is approx. four years old. If I can't drive the car enough to keep it charged I'll have to hook up the charger regularly.

A few hours later it was up to 80%. I left it on until it reached 100%.

I moved the red Mustang into the driveway and hooked it for a bit. I put it in the recondition function as the battery was pretty flat. I've got to keep that battery alive as long as possible. It's easy to keep the jump box in the trunk if I start to lose confidence in the battery.

I took the red Mustang out, intending to add at least fifty miles to the odometer. I also added a few gallons of premium gas. 

Later I took each of the cars out for a lengthy drive. 

The weather has not cooperated as we are finally getting our Winter storm blast. The Riv and the '06 Mustang have been in the garage, and I won't take them out to drive around in the rain and get dirty, The Nav sits under it's canvas canopy and stays pretty clean, so I won't drive it around either yet.

The Flex and the truck handle the daily duties as they should.

I just did some quick math, and if every battery in my four hobby cars went bad at the same time I'd have to cough up 800 dollars! That's a hit that I want to avoid, so I will make every effort to avoid that scenario. 

Luckily the weather has started to break and I have more opportunity to take the cars out. Sure, it's a "First World" problem dealing with multiple vehicles, but I'm no Jay Leno. 

This situation sometimes makes me wonder about the wisdom of having so many hobby cars. Especially if I don't have the time to drive each of them sufficiently. I have started to give consideration to putting a couple of the cars on non op, which would save me the cost of insurance and registration expenses. I sort of missed my "window" to make this decision this year, but I will be keeping it in mind in 2024.