No matter how meticulously you take care of your car’s battery, you may eventually find yourself with a dead battery. The telltale rattling sound of a car that refuses to start can give your drive a miserable start, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to replace your battery. Most of the time, simply giving your car a jump-start will be enough to get it on the road again.
How to Tell if You Need a Jump-start
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Before you attempt to jump-start your car, perform an inspection to make sure that your battery is actually the source of your car’s inability to start. If you find that a part of your engine is damaged, all the jump-starting in the world won’t get you on the road again.
Some signs that your battery may be dead or dying include:
- A rapid-fire clicking or rattling noise when you turn your ignition.
- Your lights and dashboard are unusually dim.
- Your radio or other electronic accessories don’t work.
- Your car is completely inert when you turn your ignition.
If your battery does appear to be dead, you’ll want to prepare to jump-start your car. Before calling a friend or roadside assistance company to help you out, make sure that the battery isn’t damaged. Pop open your hood and inspect your battery for any obvious damage, such as cracks, leaks or corrosion. If you notice minor corrosion around the terminals, clean the terminals with a wire brush. Don’t attempt to jump-start a damaged battery, and try to replace it as soon as possible.
Preparing to Jump-start Your Car
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Safety Concerns: After determining that you do need to jump-start your car, put on safety gear, including goggles and gloves, to ensure your safety. Remove any loose clothing, such as scarves or long coats, that could get caught in the engine compartment. Also remove any rings, watches or other metal objects.
Preparing the Car: Park the working car as closely as possible to the disabled vehicle, while making sure that the two vehicles aren’t touching. Turn off all electrical devices in both vehicles, including radios, air conditioners, fans, and lights. Remove the keys from the ignition of both vehicles. Place automatic vehicles in park and place manual transmission vehicles in neutral. In either case, remember to set the parking brake before proceeding.
Finding the Battery: Pop open the hoods on both vehicles and locate the batteries. In most vehicles, the battery is located in either the left or right front corner of the engine compartment. It will be a large, blocky object with two thick cables attached to it. If you can’t find the battery easily, consult your vehicle owner’s manual.
Identify the positive and negative terminals of the battery. The positive terminal will be black and should be marked with a visible plus sign; the negative terminal will be red and marked with a minus sign. Typically, the positive terminal is also thicker.
To complete your preparations, pull out and unwind the jumper cables. Check to see if the cables are long enough to reach between the two vehicles. Also, make sure that the cables themselves aren’t damaged or frayed. The rubber coating should be free of cracks or tears, and the clamps should be clean.
Jumping the Car
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Once you’ve finished preparing to jump your car, you can begin the actual procedure. Before you begin, however, keep this important safety rule in mind: Once you’ve connected one or more clamps to a battery, do not let the red and black ends of the jumper cables touch. Touching the cables together could complete the circuit and may cause damage to the battery, the car’s electronics, or yourself.
Remove the plastic protectors from the terminals, if there are any, and begin connecting the clamps to the batteries.
Always attach the clamps in the following order:
- Connect one red clamp to the positive terminal of the dead battery.
- Connect the next red clamp to the positive terminal of the working battery.
- Connect one black clamp to the negative terminal of the working battery.
- Connect the final black clamp to a grounded piece of metal on the dead car.
Common sense may suggest connecting the final black clamp to the negative terminal of the dead battery, but this is wrong. Connecting the black clamp to the negative terminal on the dead battery could ignite hydrogen waste gases. Don’t let the cables dangle into the engine compartment; dangling cords can get caught up and damaged in the moving parts of the engine.
Once the cables are connected, start the engine of the working car. Let the car idle for a few minutes to put a little bit of charge into the dead battery, then rev the engine slightly above idle for 30 to 60 seconds. While the engine is revving, attempt to start the disabled vehicle. A successful jump-start will allow the disabled car to start after a few attempts. If it still fails to start, there may be a deeper mechanical issue with either the car or the battery that can’t be bypassed with a jump-start. The car may need to be towed, or the battery may need to be replaced.
After The Jump Start
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Once the disabled vehicle has started, remove the cables in the reverse order of how you attached them. First remove the grounded clamp, then the clamp on the negative terminal of the original working car, then the clamp on the positive terminal of the original working car, and finally remove the clamp from the positive terminal of the previously disabled vehicle. While disconnecting the cables, don’t allow the clamps to touch each other or dangle into the engine compartment.
After the cables have been removed, keep the disabled vehicle running for at least 25 minutes and keep the engine revved above idle for at least the first five minutes. While it’s running, the engine will provide power to the alternator, which will charge the battery. After 25 minutes, your battery should have built up enough charge to start, assuming there aren’t any more serious issues at hand. If your car won’t start again after you turn it off, your battery or your alternator may need to be replaced.
Jump-starting Without Cables
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Even if you don’t have jumper cables or another car to receive a jump-start from, it’s still possible to get your car started with a little help from gravity or a pack of friends. If you’re lucky enough to be on a hill, you can do this all by yourself. If you don’t have a hill at your disposal, you may need to recruit some friends to push your vehicle instead of rolling down a hill.
In a manual vehicle, shift into first gear and depress the clutch fully. Turn your ignition as if you were going to start the engine, but stop turning when you’re about halfway there. Release your brake and coast down the hill until you hit about 5 mph. Once you reach that speed, release the clutch. You should feel the engine turn over and start. If it doesn’t start at first, then press and release the clutch again.
In an automatic vehicle, place the car in neutral and set the emergency brake. Next, shift to second gear and release the hand brake. As you coast down the hill, try to start the engine when you hit about 5 mph. Once you feel the engine start, hit your brakes while feeding gas to your engine. If it doesn’t start at first, keep giving it gas while continuing to turn your ignition key. Regardless of whether your car is a manual or automatic, drive it around for a few miles to recharge the battery after you’ve successfully start your car.
A car that won’t start is a surefire cause for frustration, but learning how to jump-start your car safely and effectively can help you minimize the hassle of a disabled vehicle.
Have you ever had to jump-start a vehicle?
Do you have any good advice as to what not to do when jump-starting a vehicle?