Whats the best Battery
 

Guys my 87 monte carlo battery died..interstate...What do you guys recommend for a tough lasting battery???I dont seem to have good luck w/interstate batteries... :evil: thanx

There is a motorcraft battery in my '99' F-150, it's the original factory battery. It's been a tough long lasting battery :)

I put 2 walmart yellow batteries in my f-350 diesel 8 years ago and still going strong.. :D

A lot of aftermarket batteries are made by US Battery in Augusta, Ga. All they do is put a different case and decals on the batteries. Every brand has a different spec, but the batteries are still made at the same place.
I would make sure you have a good alternator and no other wiring issues or a drain on the battery. Make sure you have enough battery and the correct battery for what you're doing. Intersate is a good quality battery, but not the best for many off road or racing applications.
I've used a Red top Optima battery and it's been well worth the money.
I ran it for 2 years in my race truck then put in my Duramax when I changed the race truck over to 16 Volt. (I wish the quality of the 16 volt was as good as the Optima. I pretty much have to buy a new 16 volt every season)

IMO Interstate makes about the best battery out there. I've been selling them for over 15 years and I very seldom have one fail, I'd say less than 1%. If that battery is less than a year and half old any interstate dealer should replace it free if it's the 65 month. The 75 month has 2 year free replacement and the 85 month is replaced free for 2 1/2 years. Unless you buy an optima I don't think any other manufacturer comes close to that warranty.

As Rabbit stated make sure the alternator is working right. Make sure it's not overcharging because that will ruin a battery quicker than anything else. If the car sits for long periods of time without getting used you need to trickle charge it every once in a while or use a battery maintainer.

Excide Orbital ..

Optimas are crap ... and then when they only hold 12.2volts sitting there (a good battery is 12.65 or more) the auto place you get them from says it good because it test over 12 volts on their cheap machine. Interstate dealer in town used to carry optima stuff also, untill they stopped paying him for the warranty ones.

I thought he was talking about a daily driver. If it's a drag car I would definitely go with a gel-cell such as the orbital or optima. If it's a hard leaving car a lead acid battery is a poor choice because of the slosh and depending on how it's mounted the plates can shift.

I have had decent luck with the optima but my supplier said they started getting a lot of warranties a year or 2 ago. I thought they had improved. The optima has a 3 year free replacement warranty now so I would think they must have fixed the quality issue?

I think there made by johnson controls makers of energizer , also farm & fleet stores. there great batterys. had two optimas, the worse pieces of chitt Ive ever bought

I've got a walmart everstart in my car, 3 years zero problems.

X 10,000 on the optimas being junk, the boy had one in his mustang when we got it, what a POS, previous owner said it was brand new, never would hold a charge, take charge, we ended up giving it away to his buddy who bragged about how good they were, he tossed it after being stranded a dozen or so times.
\ Cp

I bought some kind of yellow deep cycle battery from wall mart and it's been one heck of a good battery. I run a trolling motor and the winch on my trailer with it. It's probably at least 5 years old and still works fine.
Most of the Optimas that I've seen not work so well was because guys didn't take care of them. If you don't run an alternator it's critical to keep them charged after every race. I've killed it several times at the track at it charged back up without any problems I've had it for at least 3 years. I took it out of my race truck and it sat on the floor for a year then I put it in my Duramax when my truck wouldn't start one morning. It's been doing fine so I just haven't changed it out yet. Maybe I just got one of the few good ones. My luck usually doesn't go that way :) I don't remember if he was asking for a race vehicle or daily driver, but a race application ( without alt) needs some attention to last very long.
Somebody said before that NAPA makes a good battery. Don't remember which one it was.