Standing idle for months - is it OK?

[abbissus]

Hi,

Anyone can help?
There is a Soul for sale at a car dealer I am interested in. The problem is that they have had the vehicle for more than a year now.
During this time the car was stored outside. They did sometimes take it to a nearby charging station, but not regularly and are not sure how much it was charged.

No warranty - they have been stupid enough not to take it for the annual check, altough it would have been totally fine, milage is quite low...

I know from fellow members that it is not good for the battery to be stored under such conditions, also maybe charged to full and then let be standing idle for months in a row.

12V battery is depleted much (possibly killed), I know that, but nothing about the big battery.
I am planning to check it with an OBD device, using Soul Spy, Torque and Car Scanner, trying to see the health of the battery...

Do you think it would be wise to buy the car if the SOH is not too bad?

Any help would be appreciated...

 

[IanL]

I would want a very large discount on the price, owing to the lack of warranty, unless the KIA company in your country agreed to re-instate the warranty.

 

[EVDee]

Biggest factor at play: you need the battery to recalibrate itself vs giving you old & outdated data.

Basically:
- the temperature outside needs to be above 10C
- the battery needs to be fully charged then discharged to 10-15%
- then the battery needs to be fully charged again without interruption
- the battery recalibration will occur

Otherwise taking a reading will be worthless as its just the value from the last calibration which was likely before it sat and degraded.

Best of luck!

 

[abbissus]

I would want a very large discount on the price, owing to the lack of warranty, unless the KIA company in your country agreed to re-instate the warranty.

Yeah, the price is already quite reasonable, but KIA in Hungary is possibly the worst - no chance of re-instation...

 

[abbissus]

Biggest factor at play: you need the battery to recalibrate itself vs giving you old & outdated data.

Basically:
- the temperature outside needs to be above 10C
- the battery needs to be fully charged then discharged to 10-15%
- then the battery needs to be fully charged again without interruption
- the battery recalibration will occur

Otherwise taking a reading will be worthless as its just the value from the last calibration which was likely before it sat and degraded.

Best of luck!

Thank you, that was a very big help! This is the kind of info I needed, I was quite lost without it... you are the best, EVDee!!!
I am afraid the dealer (such as they are in our country) won't be easily persuaded to let me do all that, but I will surely give it a try!

 

[IanL]

Consider that at (say) 5 years into its life it could require repairs which could cost more than the vehicle was worth at that time. KIA parts are not cheap, and the repair strategy seems to be to replace large scale assemblies, rather than diagnose down to unit level. I base this on reading the KIA Service Manual. Link It's a big risk.

My thought is that you should not pay more than 60% of a fair price for the same car with warranty.

 

[abbissus]

IanL-
That is definitely good thinking. (Although I was under the impression that these cars are fairly reliable, therefore not needing much service - apart from the battery degradation problem.)
This raises a new question - what are the usual/to be expected servicing costs? Are there tipical problems one must be ready for with this model?

 

[IanL]

I think the expected costs are quite modest. It is the unexpected which worries me. For example, a fault in the under-the -hood parts of the braking system is addressed by replacing the entire assembly - vacuum pump, pressure modulator, processor...etc. I don't know the cost of that, but my guess is around $1,500 - 2,000.

 

[abbissus]

I think the expected costs are quite modest. It is the unexpected which worries me. For example, a fault in the under-the -hood parts of the braking system is addressed by replacing the entire assembly - vacuum pump, pressure modulator, processor...etc. I don't know the cost of that, but my guess is around $1,500 - 2,000.

Yeah, exactly ... I think I am gonna skip this one, try and find a better deal. Thanks for the help!