Many modern BMWs pull a lot of power from their battery and if driven on mostly brusk trips or sit for long, will have shortened bombardment life. This has been especially true for the N63 V8 powered BMWs. A smart battery charger tin help extend your BMW's battery life. BMW used to sell a rebadged BMW "Battery Tender" make charger but have since changed to a BMW-badged "CTEK" brand smart battery charger which nosotros review here.

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Recommended – CTEK (56-353) MULTI The states 7002 12-Volt Battery Charger

Smart battery chargers or bombardment tenders volition charge a battery until full and "tend" the bombardment. When the battery needs more power, it will cycle on and off keeping it full only not over charging it. This is opposed to they fashion you run into at an automobile parts store where they endeavour to rapidly bring the motorcar battery dorsum to life only will continue charging even if the battery is total. Those are not meant to stay on a battery long.

When yet another wintertime storm hitting, our E92 M3 was going to be sitting for going on 3 weeks as I've been driving our i3 in the winter weather condition. I headed to my local BMW dealer to grab another car charger as my cigarette styled older BMW Battery charger won't work on new BMWs.

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The new CTEK BMW Battery charger has alligator style clips and has 4 dissimilar charging modes. Just hook the charger's red and black alligator clips upward to your BMW and press the mode button to select either Motor Bicycle, Automobile, Common cold battery, or recondition bombardment.
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The CTEK charger charging clips are separated from the principal charger by a small orange and blackness connector. CTEK's alligator red and black clips are detached from the master charger equally a safety precaution. Connect the red prune first, then the black and so connect those via the orange and black connector to the main charging unit.

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1 can either connect the battery charger by straight accessing the BMW'south battery through the trunk or via the engine compartment on the red power last and the footing. I've done both, but discover using the engine compartment easier to get to as opposed to removing parts of the trunk lining to get to the battery. You can even road the charging cables up through the bottom of the windshield and close the engine bay lid and lock the car if needed.

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Once connected, select the automobile icon via the mode button so the CTEK charger will progress through a series of six yellow lights. The 7th calorie-free is green and means the BMW'due south bombardment is fully charged and that the smart charger has gone into a maintenance stage where it will simply charge if the battery'south voltage drops. It took 13 hours for my M3 to reach the 7th light and will depend on the state of accuse of your BMW Bombardment equally to how long information technology will take. There is an eighth light which volition light upwards if the battery needs a pinnacle off just it's hard to catch seeing information technology on. Make sure the light-green power LED low-cal is a solid green and that the line of yellow stage lights accept begun lifting up or it's not connected correctly.

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The overall size of this unit is smaller than BMW's previous version. The CTEK version as well has a very convenient black pocketbook to store it when non in utilise. The overall length is similar to the last generation and it's just over xiii anxiety long. My but pocket-size dislikes of the CTEK smart charger is that the chief blackness power cord has a lot of retentivity and kept rotating the panel of the charger face up down.

Modern BMW batteries are expensive to buy and install as the car has to exist programmed when installing a new battery. The BMW CTEK Battery Charger is a simple, inexpensive way to extend your BMW's battery and save coin in the long run. These chargers are a plug it and forget it device when storing your BMW equally they will not over charge only maintain the battery at the perfect state of charge.

The CTEK BMW Smart Battery Charger is bachelor from your local BMW dealer parts section for $95 or may exist ordered online here P/N 61432358315 and carries a 2-twelvemonth warranty.

To read our review of the previous generation BMW "Bombardment Tender" Bombardment Charger click here.