On Wed, 17 Mar 2004 18:01:03 -0500, "MZ"
wrote:

I think the point Ghee was trying to make was that as a battery gets
old and tired, its ESR increases, causing a larger voltage drop for a
given current draw, even if the associated wiring is clean and of a
proper gauge.

I've seen installations where dimming/flickering lights were solved by
replacing a five-year-old tired stock battery with a new, lower-ESR
battery. The new battery had a significantly lower ESR, both by
design and by virtue of the fact that it was new. The battery swap
was done after upgrading the power and ground leads under the hood, of
course.

People aren't replacing their batteries on a regular basis anyway?


Many people delay replacing their batteries until their car doesn't
start. It should be a routine maintenance item, but some people just
assume everything is fine until a problem crops up. It also doesn't
help that battery life varies so widely. In Texas, I felt I was doing
good to get three years out of a battery. In a more mild climate,
I've gotten significantly longer use out of batteries.

Scott Gardner