2013 F10 Battery low/drained warning??

My car is about 2 months old with 1400 miles on it. I only drive it on the weekends so M-F it sits. Just last week my car started to give me that battery drained/low warning and it would go away after driving around for 15-20mins. If i don't drive the car for the next 2-3 days the warning comes back and goes away again after i drive it around.

Is anyone else experiencing this when they don't drive the car during the week? Seems like the E60 guys have been going through battery issues for years and wondering if this is still the case on the F10 where theres so much electronics in the car something is constantly running causing more drain that affects non daily driven cars.

Alan

Yep, I drive it probably every other day but not for long trips and I experienced this a few times. I now put a battery tender on it overnight once a month and it hasn't given me a problem since.

Just get yourself a trickle charger.

BMW will categorize you as being a battery abuser and won't cover the failure.

Your warranty / maintenance docs say you need to drive 10 miles or so each day.

Strange that i never had this issue with my previous 3 series Bmw's and my driving schedule was the same with those cars. Trickle charging isn't an option since my car isnt in a garage. I guess i'll just have to live with getting this warning message every time i get behind the wheel.

Hi Alan,

The only issue is that a continuously low battery is going to have a shortened life due to sulfation, which occurs when the battery is held below 80% of full charge. Since you are not in a garage, you might consider picking up a solar charger that can be left on your dash or rear deck. If you do this, you will have to pull some wires directly from the battery under the trunk floor since all the power outlets cut off about 8 minutes after shutdown. This idea could easily resolve the issue for you and is not too hard to implement.

There are several threads on this issue here. Bottom line - you need a battery tender. I drive mine only on the weekends as well, so I use a battery tender. See link below.

http://www.amazon.com/Battery-Tender...=pd_sim_auto_1

Are there any aux outlets inside the car that stay "hot" even with the engine off? My c6 lighter plug is always on, so my ctek charger just plugs into that.
Very convenient.

AGM batteries deliver their best life performance if recharged before allowed to drop below the 50% discharge rate. If you keep taking out more than you put back in, your battery will not last very long. If you cannot attach a battery tender to your car, I would give your battery a good deep charge at least once a month.

I think its just your car telling you that you made all these upgrades and now I want to be taken out more regularly. Like I told you - you made a hot girl into a supermodel and now she wants to be treated as such...

On the other end - I have to hand it to you folks that leave your nice car parked at home and commute in something else. You have a lot more self control then I do...,

Yeah, I know. I work downtown Chicago, so I only commute to the train station, and just use my other car for that. I certainly do not want to drive this thing about 120 miles daily to work. Couple that with traffic headache, parking, etc.

Originally Posted by miamiboyca

On the other end - I have to hand it to you folks that leave your nice car parked at home and commute in something else. You have a lot more self control then I do...,

Originally Posted by mrcamp

Yeah, I know. I work downtown Chicago, so I only commute to the train station, and just use my other car for that. I certainly do not want to drive this thing about 120 miles daily to work. Couple that with traffic headache, parking, etc.

Is 60 miles out of Chicago still considered a suburb or a sub sub suburb... LOL

I guess I forget about the folks that take trains and such into work due the traffic going into the city. (NY/CHI, etc)

For me it would take me longer driving to work in NYC and cost more money so leaving my baby home safe was easy.

Plus I can't imagine letting any parking attendant park my car everyday inches next to another car. I rather deal with the crazy hooligans on the metro lol

Alan

Originally Posted by mrcamp

There are several threads on this issue here. Bottom line - you need a battery tender. I drive mine only on the weekends as well, so I use a battery tender. See link below.

http://www.amazon.com/Battery-Tender...=pd_sim_auto_1

I contacted Deltran and asked which Battery Tender I should use for a absorbed glass mat (AGM) battery that is in our cars. They told me to use their Battery Tender Plus Gel unit.

I use it religiously as my car is driven sporadically. And still, my battery died and had to be replaced at 10 months, 7100 miles.

I typically find that my BMW's have battery warnings if they sit out in cold weather overnight. I typically dont see an issue in the garage or if they are left out overnight in the summer.

Originally Posted by readthis13

I typically find that my BMW's have battery warnings if they sit out in cold weather overnight. I typically dont see an issue in the garage or if they are left out overnight in the summer.

Were you live anything left out at night is either dead or frozen

I'm having the same problem.

Hired a driver to take me to Newark airport and then drive the car back home. That was close to 5 hours of driving. So the battery had a good charge.

Came home after 10 days. The car was parked in the garage, so no cold weather and went I started it I got the warning about incresed battery dischaged while parked. I started it and cleared the control message. When I turned the car off, the display said charge battery. So, I hooked up the battery tender and left it on for 3 days. No change. I went down to the garage and started it and the display is still telling me I have a low battery. Appointment made at the dealer. I typically don't drive this car most of the summer, so it's nothing for this car to have sat 6 weeks at a time and not been started and I've never had this message. I'd say it's time for a new battery.

My experience with Battery Tenders is that they do not have the oomph to bring batteries in lower states of charge back up adequately. For that, an older style charger with a amp meter on the front work mush better in my experience. Battery Tenders seem to do best when continuously connected to a pretty well charged battery sitting idle and not asked to deliver a lot of juice.

Just my .02

Regards,
Don M

This is most likely because of your stage 2 set up. On my e60 when I would leave my can tool plugged into my car over a couple of day I would get the same error. But this only happened when I left it plugged in. This is also happening to an F10 owner on the other site who also has stage 2. This did not happen to his car when he had stage 1.... Just a thought, but you have to check all avenues, and this seems like a logical explanation.

^^ I would have thought that too but i started getting the warning message before I installed any tune on my car.

Alan

Originally Posted by Alan L.

^^ I would have thought that too but i started getting the warning message before I installed any tune on my car.

Alan

Well then hell, I am fresh out of ideas for you then..

The dealer has had the car for two days now. They said that they think it's fixed but they're not sure. I don't understand that. The SA said that even though I've had the car for 13 months the car was never taken out of transport mode. They said that the computer was never going to sleep. Not sure what all of that means, but it's weird that they said that they're not sure if it's fixed.

Originally Posted by miamiboyca

I think its just your car telling you that you made all these upgrades and now I want to be taken out more regularly. Like I told you - you made a hot girl into a supermodel and now she wants to be treated as such...

On the other end - I have to hand it to you folks that leave your nice car parked at home and commute in something else. You have a lot more self control then I do...,

x2

Life is too short to drive something lesser than whats in your garage. Drive it, pay a little more gas, little more wear and tear, and enjoy the damned thing.

I'm paying too much for it to collect dust.

I put 15k miles on my SRT in 11 months, and I've had my F02 for 2 months and have 3k miles on her now.

Just drive her :P

Had my 2012 535xi CPO for 3 weeks, this AM warning light for xdrive and ABS, went off upon startup. Shut down restarted without incident. Later restarted and all warning fault lights and command center messages went off, EDC, ABS, drive etc. Then went out. Dealer says voltage issue, and is running diagnostics. Battery was replaced 4 mo. ago, Car is driven 60 miles every day.

Originally Posted by kssod

Dealer says voltage issue, and is running diagnostics. Battery was replaced 4 mo. ago, Car is driven 60 miles every day.

Wow. Keep us posted.

I came across this TSB, Has anyone had this specific repair, and if so what does it entail?

Vehicle: 2012 BMW 5 Series
Nature of Defect:
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM
Bulletin Number:
SIB-61-02-12 Bulletin Date:
Jan 2012
Summary:
BMW: ELECTRONIC MALFUNCTION AND VARIOUS CHECK CONTROL MESSAGES ARE DISPLAYED IN CID (CENTRAL INFORMATION DISPLAY) AND INSTRUMENT CLUSTER. ( NHTSA ITEM NUMBER - 10043862 )