kickbacked
Master
- Jan 12, 2010
- 2,390
- 113
So this past week I've been had multiple emergency calls for vehicles broken down. Multiple of the people calling were people I had said, "this car needs an alternator", "this car needs a battery" weeks prior to the blizzard. They didnt listen, and brushed it off. One of them even took advice from a friend over the phone whom diagnosed the car based on the girl emulating what the car sounded like and came to a completely different conclusion than I did (based off testing components with my dvom). Im no master tech but I did do 2 years of auto tech in college, and have a decent understanding. However when I was in school hybrids were just coming out and ive never been a huge fan nor really cared about learning about them. Fast forward to today and Im trying to jump start this hybrid. It has a trunk battery, now my bmw does as well and im sure many new cars are going to that since they have a hard enough time fitting engines in automobiles today with all the plastics and small engine compartments. I couldnt do anything with this hybrid. Couldnt put it in neutral, couldnt pop the trunk, couldnt even get the key out of the stupid little port. I had to quickly google where the positive pole under the hood was (hidden in the fuse box). After today ive had enough of breaking out the jumper cables and wrapping them back up. I watched a project farm video, I went to amazon and bought a noco gbx75 portable jump starter. Great reviews, isnt the most expensive or powerful but im not trying to get a semi, or front loader to turn over.
My question here is every review video ive seen says to connect the positive to positive battery post, and negative to negative battery post (duh). But will these things read a battery connection if i have to jump a car with a battery in the trunk? Basically can I jump a car just using a positive terminal under the hood and grounding to the body or engine block? Or do i need to tear open the trunk and get to the battery? Seems pretty straight forward that it should work since its how you jump with cables, but part of me is questioning if the computers in these jumpers will have an issue not being directly connected to the battery.
Put this in the survival section because im trying to survive the headache of people coming to me with "my tire light is on", " my car wont start", "im stuck in the middle of a highway in a blizzard and need to be pushed off" (that woman put her foot on the brake and held it after i told them to put it in neutral so i could push it) , etc. Im losing my mind here, I recognize that vehicles break with no warning. However when something begins to fail on my vehicle I replace it immediately. I understand we are in the Christmas season but that doesnt mean your dash needs to be lit up like a tree. While charging a persons battery prior to the blizzard I looked at the oil and told them it was black and needed to be changed. I was then told " oil is supposed to be black".
My question here is every review video ive seen says to connect the positive to positive battery post, and negative to negative battery post (duh). But will these things read a battery connection if i have to jump a car with a battery in the trunk? Basically can I jump a car just using a positive terminal under the hood and grounding to the body or engine block? Or do i need to tear open the trunk and get to the battery? Seems pretty straight forward that it should work since its how you jump with cables, but part of me is questioning if the computers in these jumpers will have an issue not being directly connected to the battery.
Put this in the survival section because im trying to survive the headache of people coming to me with "my tire light is on", " my car wont start", "im stuck in the middle of a highway in a blizzard and need to be pushed off" (that woman put her foot on the brake and held it after i told them to put it in neutral so i could push it) , etc. Im losing my mind here, I recognize that vehicles break with no warning. However when something begins to fail on my vehicle I replace it immediately. I understand we are in the Christmas season but that doesnt mean your dash needs to be lit up like a tree. While charging a persons battery prior to the blizzard I looked at the oil and told them it was black and needed to be changed. I was then told " oil is supposed to be black".
