Effect of Battery specs on performance?

marty085 · Postby **marty085** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 7:21 pm

So I pulled the battery out of my new NA8 today and found that the previous owner had recently installed this:

http://www.supercheapauto.com.au/online ... 0555#Cross

Obviously I knew it was a cheapie the moment I saw the label. 270CCA. As you can probably see in the photo, to my surprise the battery says "Not suitable for vehicles with EFI". My question is, would having this battery in the mx5 adversely affect performance under full throttle between 2-3k rpm? You may recall that I started a thread last week about the flat spot that I'd noticed between 2-3 in the car. Well, I changed the battery to a Supercharge MF43, and maybe its placebo affect but it seems to be a bit more responsive?

I found very little on this "Battery not suitable for vehicles with EFI" subject on Google, except a link to the battery on the SCA website.

markwid · Postby **markwid** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 8:24 pm

Not sure if it matters or not, I think the original battery has 440 CCA.

ricky-pinky · Postby **ricky-pinky** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 8:55 pm

CCA stands for Cold Cranking Amps and is a measure of the battery's ability to pump out amps at 0 degrees Fahrenheit before the voltage drops too low. If the voltage gets too low on an EFI vehicle the ECU may not let the engine start. This won't happen on a carburetted car. The starter motor will just grind to a halt after a while, but the engine might just 'catch' before it does. It affects starting only. It won't cause a 'flat spot' while driving.

MrRevhead · Postby **MrRevhead** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:18 pm

ricky-pinky wrote:CCA stands for Cold Cranking Amps and is a measure of the battery's ability to pump out amps at 0 degrees Fahrenheit before the voltage drops too low. If the voltage gets too low on an EFI vehicle the ECU may not let the engine start. This won't happen on a carburetted car. The starter motor will just grind to a halt after a while, but the engine might just 'catch' before it does. It affects starting only. It won't cause a 'flat spot' while driving.

In addition to the above, it more than likely isn't an AGM battery, which may cause some ventilation/leakage problems.

marty085 · Postby **marty085** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:18 pm

Cool, thanks for that info.

So why would a battery not be suitable for a car with EFI?

Postby **NitroDann** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:25 pm

Lol, read the thread.

marty085 · Postby **marty085** » Sun Jun 22, 2014 9:36 pm

Good point, sorry gents. That's what happens when you read a post whilst watching Men in Black on TV and preparing a job application concurrently :oops: