Any way to tell how much life is left in the battery?

[Klayfish]

I'm still trying to learn about these cars, so forgive me if it's a dumb question. But I want to know what I'm getting into before I consider buying one.

I know a replacement, even aftermarket, is fairly expensive. Is there any way to really tell roughly how much life is left in the battery? As I mentioned in my other thread, I've got an '08 Honda Fit at my disposal. It gets about 38-40mpg. I'm considering selling it. I'd be looking at the lower to middle price range for Insights. If I got one that was in almost immediate need of a new battery, it may not be worth it. I realize that all batteries wear out at some point, and I realize there's no way to say with 100% accuracy that the battery will die in exactly xx years/months/weeks/days. But a way to get an educated guess is better than nothing.

[RedJellyBean]

Originally Posted by Klayfish

I'm still trying to learn about these cars, so forgive me if it's a dumb question. But I want to know what I'm getting into before I consider buying one.

I know a replacement, even aftermarket, is fairly expensive. Is there any way to really tell roughly how much life is left in the battery? As I mentioned in my other thread, I've got an '08 Honda Fit at my disposal. It gets about 38-40mpg. I'm considering selling it. I'd be looking at the lower to middle price range for Insights. If I got one that was in almost immediate need of a new battery, it may not be worth it. I realize that all batteries wear out at some point, and I realize there's no way to say with 100% accuracy that the battery will die in exactly xx years/months/weeks/days. But a way to get an educated guess is better than nothing.

The safest bet would be an Insight with the dead battery and a new battery from Bumblebee, and a grid charger. After the up-front investment the new battery should hopefully last the life of the car.

I bought an insight with a dead battery myself.. but I'm still using it because I've been able to keep it working pretty reliably with a grid charger, clutch switch and OBDIIC&C gauge.

[Eli]

Unfortunately, the answer to your thread title is "No. (not without experience)".

If I got one that was in almost immediate need of a new battery, it may not be worth it.

Right. So if you're concerned about the battery, you want to find an Insight that needs a new battery, or is in a price range where you can factor in a new battery anyway.

In general, replacing parts on the Insight is a good thing. When you replace the battery yourself, it becomes a known. Find a nice, but cheap specimen that is cheap because the IMA light is on, or just expect it to come on and any drive time you get before it does is a bonus ... and we'll be here when you're ready.

Remember though that even if you have to replace the battery every 100,000 miles, the Insight is still the cheapest thing on the road to drive. A new(not refurbished) battery should easily last 100,000 miles - depending, of course, on how many miles you drive per year.

[Klayfish]

Thanks for the responses. I'm trying to figure a "worst case scenario" as to what I'd spend, as long as I do my research well. Is there anything else in the IMA system I could reasonably expect to have to replace at some point in the cars' lifetime? Not that I'd want to, because I'd certainly get the car fixed, but is there a way to drive the car as a purely gas only car for a period of time? Anyone know what kind of fuel mileage it gets that way?

Eli,
Thanks for your responses to both threads. My commute is 25 miles of flat country road. Only about 3 miles of that is "city" driving. The rest is traffic free 2 lane roads, where I cruise at 50-55mph. I don't use a/c much, I prefer to have the windows open, but there are some days where 95 and humid is just too much for open windows. Obviously, I do use the heat in the winter. Single digit days here are rare, but they happen. Most days are 20-25 degrees in the early morning. I'm still teaching myself how to fix cars, but I think I'd have enough skill to replace the battery myself. I assume it's nothing overly complicated.

RedJelly,
You mentioned in the other thread that your battery has only 8% life left. How were you able to determine that? If you don't mind me asking, how much did you spend for the clutch switch, charger and gauge? What fuel mileage are you getting "as is"?

[Eli]

Sounds like you have the perfect commute for the Insight. You could expect 80-90mpg on such a commute once you get the hang of it, I bet.

Failure of other IMA system components is extremely rare.

Yes, you can drive the car as gas only and typically get 45-55mpg.

Worst case scenario is you spend 8k on a car advertised as having a new battery and you end up having to replace the battery anyway. I think the sweet spot in that regard is 4-5k.. If you replace the battery you have a $6-7k Insight.. with a known new battery.

Unless you wait to find the perfect one owner, all records car - and are prepared to fly for it, just expect to fix some things. These cars are getting older and the nature of mechanical things is to break. But like I said, in general replacing things is a good thing because then they become knowns. If you have to replace the IMA battery, EGR valve, O2 sensor or get a water leak fixed these are just the quirks of the Insight and the replacement parts should be good for many tens of thousands of smiles.

[RedJellyBean]

Originally Posted by Klayfish

RedJelly,
You mentioned in the other thread that your battery has only 8% life left. How were you able to determine that? If you don't mind me asking, how much did you spend for the clutch switch, charger and gauge? What fuel mileage are you getting "as is"?

My car cost $2800. I spent $200 putting two new tires on the rear, $200 on an OBDIIC&C gauge, the grid charger cost about $100, and the clutch switch was less than $5.00 using a simple switch from Radio Shack, wired to the neutral safety switch. That's the bulk of what I've spent on the car to get the battery working at a consistent level where I'll at least get enough assist to get up to speed.
The OBDIIC&C gauge allows you to monitor amp-hour inflow and outflow from the battery. I have about 0.20Ah usable on my battery between the 80 percent and 68 percent state of charge before the car throws an IMA light. For reference, I think most folks should get about 4.5Ah out of their stock batteries, or 6Ah out of a bumblebee battery.
My fuel economy is varied. I got 84mpg on a trip from San Diego to Los Angeles one Friday many months ago. I'm living in the horrible midwest now. On very cold, 10 degree days, where I have to run the defroster and I'm blasting down the freeway at 75-80mph to get to work, I'm getting about 60mpg for the 49 mile trip. In warmer weather, it's good for about 65-70mpg on the same length of trip. I got 80mpg on that trip once but I hate going slow.

What I love about the Insight is that you can drive it fast and still get great fuel economy.


Oh... I mention this to everyone but InsightCentral. My car has paid for itself already.. in fact, with my current commute, it's paid for itself within 9 months of purchasing it, from the fuel savings alone, when compared to the car it replaced, a supercharged Lexus LS400.

Final thought, on your specific commute, you should be able to get 80mpg in a 5-speed Insight once you learn how to drive the car in the most efficient way. I'm still learning and I've had my car over a year - and I've been involved in 'hypermiling' events since 2008.

[jeff652]

You should be able to get a great deal if you are smart. The market for Insights is soft right now. This is probably the best time of year to be buying one.

I have one that I fixed up that is not moving. I'll probably just park it in the garage until the summer though, not a big deal.

[Eli]

Plus gas prices are low. That always depresses their value.

I filled up for less than $30 at Costco the other day.

It's sad when we consider $2.9x/gal a great bargain.

[freezin4]

Klay,
Do a search for the procedure to estimate the capacity.
Start with a full SOC. (and this may be a bit time consuming to achieve for a limited test drive.) Then you drive and time the seconds of FULL ASSIST you get with aggressive acceleration, or hill climb. (Stop counting when you let up due to traffic.)
If I recall correctly, a perfect (Honda) battery should give you 4 minutes total ? Roughly ?
Eli, please chime in.

[Eli]

I've tried to explain how to do the basic test before, but I really think it's almost impossible for a starry-eyed new Insight owner to do anything like that and make sense of it. Just the task of keeping your eyes on the road while watching the dash closely enough to catch the nuances of IMA behavior takes some time to master.

What you're really looking for is SoC behavior, since "full assist" is arbitrary and largely dependent on the condition and temperature of the battery.

Use "pulse and charge" to get the battery up to full, and then find a long, steep hill where you can preferably climb for several minutes straight.

Slow down to 40mph(if you can) in 5th gear, and floor it up the hill. If you get going too fast, let up with the clutch in so you don't regen.

Watch the battery gauge like a hawk, while also watching the assist gauge.

Note the point in the SoC gauge where assist stops and the gauge bars begin dropping away quickly. This is called a negative recalibration.

The idea here is to get as much out of the SoC gauge as possible. Ideally, you would use up all the bars before assist is cut off.

Do the same thing on the way down the hill. Lightly tap the brake pedal to engage full regen, and see how many bars you get back before the regen is cut off and the bars quickly begin filling to the top. This is called a positive recalibration. The higher you can get it before this happens, the better. Again, ideally, you would get it all the way to the top before regen is cut off.

If the battery is bad enough, this type of use will be the first to trigger an IMA light.

If you can use more than 50% of the gauge before the negative recal(it will likely be about the same on the charge side), you probably have 6mo to a year of battery life left, again totally depending on your specific driving habits and conditions. If you can use the whole gauge, you probably have a year+ left.

Unfortunately that's about as far out as you can predict with the basic information from the dash. There's very little difference from a dash cluster standpoint between a brand new battery and one operating at only 50%, for example.

Good luck!