The battery industry has whittled down to only half-a-handful of manufacturers in the US, the largest, by far being Johnson Controls, Inc. (JCI) JCI supplies the batteries sold by AutoZone ("DuraLast"), O'Reilly's, Advance/CarQuest ("AutoCraft"), Sears ("DieHard"), Costco (formerly "Kirkland"), and most everyone else. (They also own the "Optima" brand of spiral-wound, absorbed glass mat batteries.) The batteries they send directly to their own retailers are branded as "Interstate". They also sell to Wal*Mart. All of JCIs batteries go through a series of quality checks at the end of the production line before they get shipped out. It has long been suspected and rumored that because Wal*Mart beats down their suppliers so badly, the bottom 30% of the batteries tested off the line go to Wal*Mart. I can tell you from first-hand experience at two major auto parts retailers that by far the largest number of cores turned in when a new battery is purchased were sold by Wal*Mart. (Maybe because they sell the most batteries...?) At any rate, I believe this is a case of "You get what you pay for", and perhaps it's best to go somewhere, anywhere, other than Wal*Mart for a battery.
Exide is the other large, still independent battery manufacturer in the US, and I think they still supply NAPA's batteries. The HomeDepots around here sell Exide-branded batteries at great prices, though the group size availability is limited.
Mark in rainy Centennial, CO
On May 13, 2018 at 3:05 PM "Nate vwnate1@yahoo.com [diesel_mercedes]" <diesel_mercedes@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
I used my coupe to take SWMBO where she needed to go and when her daughter took her out Saturday, I swapped the known good battery out of my coupe into the wagon along with the nifty little "innovia" voltage display thing I bought @ wallymart way back when I was in Texas just after hurricane katrina, when the alternator in my then '78 coupe died, plugged it into the cigarette lighter socket and it fired right up and began to charge @ 14 VDC indicating the alternator and starter were both good so we saddled up and dove to wallymart Gardena and bought a new 900 CCA battery and a pair of those felt anti corrosion washers for the posts, the old ones were still corrosion free but...I'd spotted some whitish powdery stuff in the battery tray and so also bought a box of baking soda, when we got home I removed the coupe's battery from the wagon and mixed up a pail of baking soda and water, used it and my hands to clean all the corrosion off, dabbed it dry with the napkins I found and left it to dry out before installing the new battery ($135.00) and buttoning both cars up .-NATE" Farming is easy when your plow is a pencil and you're a thousand miles away "- Dwight David Eisenhower
Posted by: MARK BRAUER <beeser@comcast.net>
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