Wal-Mart ValuePower car batteries ($49)

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I was at Wal-Mat the other day looking for a battery for my Citroen 2CV. This car takes a smaller than normal sized battery and Wal-Mart does not list this car in their database. But I did pull up the dimensions on my phone from a British website in millimeters. The women did not have a tape measure so I told her I'd have to measure the battery on my car and come back.

Unlike allot of cars, this car will actually turn over on 12 volts. Most cars will not turn over at all below 12.6 volts. Mine must have a dead cell but it doesn't take that many cold cranking amps or volts to turn a 600cc 2 cylinder engine over.

I noticed Wal-Mart is selling a cheaper version called ValuePower for around $50. They have a one year warranty.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/VP-65-Battery...742&veh=sem

Any of you guys tried these yet? The link above has 69 reviews with 5 stars.

Batteries are being made cheaper and cheaper. I remember 25 years ago you could get a new battery with a 5 year warranty for less than $50. Now a battery with a 2 year warranty cost over a hundred dollars. No doubt they are going from solid lead plates to lead coated plastic plates that flake off and die all of a sudden.

I've always wondered if more expensive batteries (with longer warranties) are really that much better. Are you paying for a better battery or just a pro-rated replacement warranty? Pro-rated warranties are a rip off anyway.

And if the battery goes flat (like leaving your headlights on), if you don't recharge it within a couple of days, it won't hold a charge for more than a week. Maybe that's just the norm with batteries that are not the deep cycle type.

Two things I've done in the past to extend the life of a battery past it's warranty. Top off the cells with distilled water every year. Connect a trickle charger to the battery while the car is not driven within a week. Such as in the case if you have a classic car that is not driven at all during the winter.

I even hook a trickle charger to my Subaru's battery in the summer because I'm usually driving one of my classic cars during the summer and the Subaru sits in the garage mostly from April to November. It's almost 15 years old and has only 78,000 miles on it!

The original battery on my Subaru lasted 5 years and the second battery lasted about 7. I think the current battery has been on the car for almost 4 years.

What is the typical life of a battery with a 2 year warranty? Does 2 years mean it's guaranteed to last at least 2 years or anything past 2 years is living no borrowed time?
 
I haven't seen anyone dis-satisfied with them here other than that they only have a few sizes. If there is one that fits your car, you should buy it.
 
Those Valupower batteries come in at a lower price point for a reason. Less lead used in manufacturing and also made and imported from Saudi Arabia.

I would only buy one to put in a beater I am need to sell and not any daily driver.
 
If you treat the battery right, it might be fine. The 2 year warranty is to reduce the retailers cost in which Wal-Mart passes the savings onto the customer.
Too many people do dumb things with car batteries and wont admit it.
 
I put one in my Honda Ridgeline. It was made by the same manufacture and had the same ratings as the Honda branded battery that I took out with a 5 year warranty. The only difference is you are not paying for the warranty up front on the Value Power battery. I would use with confidence.
 
I have had one in my Corolla for well over a year and its been fine so far.

I just put one in my 240sx over the weekend. This one was physically much smaller than the Everstart Maxx that it replaced, but it spins the starter every bit as well as the Everstart did, and had a very similar CCA rating.

I doubt I'll have either one of these cars long enough to need another replacement battery (I say that every time....) so that's why I went with the Value Power.
 
Those batteries have a one year warranty, not a two year warranty. Wal-Mart might have asked Johnson Controls to make them a cheaper battery, or they could have just slapped a different label on the same battery. Who knows. At any rate, I would gladly use one and expect at least 2 years of use out of one down here, and perhaps 3 to 4 years up north, and maybe more if you barely drive it and keep it on the trickle charger.
 
Originally Posted By: bubbatime
Those batteries have a one year warranty, not a two year warranty. Wal-Mart might have asked Johnson Controls to make them a cheaper battery, or they could have just slapped a different label on the same battery. Who knows. At any rate, I would gladly use one and expect at least 2 years of use out of one down here, and perhaps 3 to 4 years up north, and maybe more if you barely drive it and keep it on the trickle charger.


The last size that I looked at had the ValuePower 100 CCA less than the regular battery and the regular battery was 100 CCA less than their premium battery. I have no idea if the labels were correct or not.
 
Turbo, if you cant find the size to fit, look at motorcycle batteries; they come in a large variety of sizes. Not sure that Wal Mart has a lot, but check out Battery Warehouse, or similar outlets. Maybe even shop online.
 
I have a 2CV and a Dyane. You need a 26R size battery. I actually have a ValuePower in the Dyane currently without issue.
 
Originally Posted By: Ben Boyle
I have a 2CV and a Dyane. You need a 26R size battery. I actually have a ValuePower in the Dyane currently without issue.


That's great! Your the first person I've talked to in the US with a 2CV or Dyane. Are here any US based forums? I'm on two, one in the UK and one in Australia.

Yesterday I was going to connect a trickle charger to my 2CV and decided to check the battery voltage first. I had not driven it in over a week and to my surprise it measured 12.9 volts! One day I measured it at 12.0 volts. That's why I thought it was bad. So I don't know what's going on. Unless my meter is defective. I need to confirm this with another meter.

The only battery I have ever seen that read higher than 12.6 volts fully charged was those yellow batteries Wal-mart sold. Dad had one on his truck that measured 13.2 volts fully charged. I wonder if these have an extra cell in them?

Incidentally those "yellow" batteries that Wal-Mart used to sell were the best batteries. I had one on my Fiat Spider and it lasted 12 years! I can't remember who makes them. I'm wanting to say "maxx" or something.

Here's my 2CV:

http://s222.photobucket.com/user/turbofiat/library/Citroen 2CV?sort=2&page=1
 
Originally Posted By: tc1446
Turbo, if you cant find the size to fit, look at motorcycle batteries; they come in a large variety of sizes. Not sure that Wal Mart has a lot, but check out Battery Warehouse, or similar outlets. Maybe even shop online.


Someone here in the United States actually had a lawnmower battery on their Trabant! Like I said, it doesn't take that many CCA to turn over a 2 cylinder 600cc engine with an 8:1 C/R!

My Trabant has a 6 volt electrical system (pre 1984 models). I bought an Excide battery for it after I had the car shipped over here from Hungary. The importer said the battery wouldn't hold a charge more than a day so I bought one before the truck driver dropped it off.

When it was new, it produced around 6.4 volts. It has a 2 year warranty. It's going on 5 years. Last time I checked it after the car sat for awhile, it was producing around 6 volts. Yet had enough energy to turn the engine over. I topped it off with distilled water. I hope I can get a few more years out of it.

One good thing about the 2CV, you can flip the jack handle around backwards and use it to crank the engine over. Only problem is this only works on a stone cold engine. Like all of my other carbureted engines, when it's in the 90s, I have to crank and crank the engine over for 15 seconds to refill the fuel bowel. It seems carbureted engines hate modern fuels which have a lower boiling point. So all the fuel evaporates out of the carburetor if the engine is hot and the engine sits for 15 minutes.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: Kruse
Originally Posted By: bubbatime
Those batteries have a one year warranty, not a two year warranty. Wal-Mart might have asked Johnson Controls to make them a cheaper battery, or they could have just slapped a different label on the same battery. Who knows. At any rate, I would gladly use one and expect at least 2 years of use out of one down here, and perhaps 3 to 4 years up north, and maybe more if you barely drive it and keep it on the trickle charger.


The last size that I looked at had the ValuePower 100 CCA less than the regular battery and the regular battery was 100 CCA less than their premium battery. I have no idea if the labels were correct or not.


I put a new one on a HF impedance tester and it came in about 10% better than the sticker reads. However I've seen this with more expensive, higher rated batteries as well. Midtronics acknowledges that testing new batteries will falsely read high with their similar tech.
 
Originally Posted By: TurboFiat124


The only battery I have ever seen that read higher than 12.6 volts fully charged was those yellow batteries Wal-mart sold. Dad had one on his truck that measured 13.2 volts fully charged. I wonder if these have an extra cell in them?




no but there are two slightly different chemestries and you got a "maintenance free" yellow one which requires nearly 15 volts to charge and will give up a few 1/10s at rest as well. If you run this in something european not originally designed for it, it might be good to top it off with a charger at home once in a while.
 
I was really close with going with one of these for my truck, but there was a ~$30 difference between that and the EverStart. 5 year warranty and more cold cranking amps.

Less lead used in the cheaper battery is interesting. When these first came out, I was under the impression from folks here they were literally the same battery as the EverStart, but with a different label and warranty and that the lower cost was from the 1 year warranty. When I compared the 2 side by side, they didn't look identical at all. They were both black and they were both batteries.. that's about it.
 
I double checked my battery voltage on my 2CV and is in fact 12.9 volts!

IMG_20170425_121609767_zpsadz1kjnm.jpg


The other day I checked it at exactly 12 volts. What's going on with this battery?
 
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