Car Battery Date Codes What Do They Mean K3

[crazyoildude]

i just went to wal mart and got one of those cheap $48.88 car batteries for my back up generator

The date code was K-3 What does that mean??

 

[901Memphis]

November 2013

 

[AZjeff]

$48.88 for a 2 year old battery doesn't sound very cheap.

 

[901Memphis]

That's how they used to be, letters are month A-L (A=January,L= December) and the number is the year.

 

[crazyoildude]

it was actually K5

 

[mrsilv04]

Originally Posted By: crazyoildude
it was actually K5


Well now, that makes a big difference....

 

[crazyoildude]

I think it is a Johnson controls ...I may never use it but just in case the generator has a battery issue i can pop this in pretty quick,,It will sit in my basement fully charged on standby ..

 

[JHZR2]

Ive not seen a code like that on most batteries for years. Most have a straightforward month and year code, e.g. Nov15 on a colored sticker.

 

[crazyoildude]

I thought the same thing on my duralast gold it is a conventional 3/10

 

[cat843]

The cell caps on JCI batteries have the corners cut at 45 degrees.

 

[DuckRyder]

I believe East Penn uses that format...
Not sure about Exide.

All of the JCI I've seen have a simple month and year.

 

[901Memphis]

Yep the east Penn uses that code, was looking at batteries at kmart and almost all were fresh G5/K5 saw one M4

 

[Nick1994]

I've seen O'Reilly Auto Parts batteries have that kind of date code lately

 

[artbuc]

Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
I believe East Penn uses that format...
Not sure about Exide.

All of the JCI I've seen have a simple month and year.


East Penn skips the letter "I" to avoid mistaking it for the number "1". So the letter "M" stands for December.