Two things bring people to this page: a car that won’t turn over, or a quote for a battery that looked higher than it should have. We can deal with both. A battery from us is the part at cost for whatever your car takes, plus £40 to fit, so the only figure that moves is the battery itself.
Before we sell you one, we test the battery and the charging system, because a flat battery is very often a symptom rather than the fault. We’re at Medway City Estate in Strood, and we work on all makes and models, petrol, diesel, hybrid and electric.
Batteries rarely give up without warning. These are the signs drivers usually notice first:
Stop-start going quiet is the one worth acting on early. The car withdraws it once the battery drops below par, so it often arrives weeks before the morning the engine won’t turn at all.
It’s a small job, and the value is in doing all of it rather than half of it. Here’s how it runs.
Step 1: Test the battery and the charging system. We put the battery under load and see what it actually holds and what it cranks at, then check what the alternator is putting back with the engine running. If something is still drawing current after the car is locked, a voltage-drop check will find it. Replacing a battery that was never the problem is the most common wasted spend in this part of the trade.
Step 2: Tell you what it needs and what it costs. We explain the readings in plain words, then price it: the battery at cost for whatever your car takes, plus £40 to fit. An ordinary car takes an ordinary battery. A stop-start car needs an AGM or EFB, which costs considerably more, and that’s usually the whole difference between a cheap quote and an accurate one. Nothing starts until you say yes.
Step 3: Fit it with the power kept on. We keep a supply to the car while the old battery is out, so radio codes, stored settings and learned data stay where they are and no warning lights come on for the sake of it. Terminals are cleaned and the earth is checked, because a corroded terminal gives every symptom of a dead battery and a new battery only hides it until the corrosion catches up again.
Step 4: Register the new battery to the car. Most cars built in the last decade or so manage charging through their own electronics, and the car has to be told a new battery is in. Left unregistered, it carries on charging to suit the old one, so the new battery is overcharged or undercharged from day one and its life is cut short. We code it wherever the vehicle calls for it.
Step 5: Check it and hand it back. We recheck charging voltage with the engine running and the electrics loaded, confirm the stop-start comes back in where it should, and tell you what we found. If most of your driving is short town runs, we’ll mention it, because that’s the pattern that shortens battery life more than anything else.
A car that won’t start has several possible causes and only one of them is answered by a new battery. If the alternator isn’t charging, the battery is flat because nothing is filling it, and a new one will be flat again within days. A parasitic drain does the same thing overnight: a boot light staying on, an aftermarket alarm, a module that never goes to sleep. Either way you’ve got a perfectly good battery and exactly the same symptoms.
Then there’s ordinary use. A battery needs a decent run to recover from starting the engine, and town driving never quite puts back what it takes out, so it loses ground over months rather than days. Most last four or five years, and it’s the first proper cold spell that finishes a tired one off, which is why they all seem to fail in the same fortnight.
We test before we sell. If the battery is sound and something else is flattening it, we’ll say so and sort the actual fault rather than hand you a bill for a part you didn’t need. When it does need replacing, you get the correct type for the car, fitted with the power maintained and registered to the vehicle, using parts from suppliers such as GSF and Euro Car Parts. Pricing is upfront with no hidden extras, nothing is done without your approval, and you speak to the people doing the work rather than a call centre.
Most of this work is for the Medway towns, so Chatham, Gillingham, Rochester, Strood and Rainham, but cars come to the workshop from a good deal further out than that: Maidstone, Sittingbourne, Faversham and Sheppey, and from Canterbury, Ashford, Dartford and Gravesend. Nobody drives that far for a battery on its own. They come because the job is done in full and priced the same way each time.
You leave knowing which battery is in the car, why that type was chosen for it, that the car has been told about it, and what the charging system was doing before and after. If the car won’t start where it’s parked, ask about collection or recovery and we’ll see what can be arranged.
Phone: 01634 510 780
Email: bookings@medwayvehicleservices.
co.uk
Unit 3 Cliffe Yard, Anthonys Way, Medway City Estate, Rochester, Kent, ME2 4DY
