which battery?

[lightningad]

I am about to replace the battery on my 96 3rd gen, but am confused by differing advice i've been given.

One carparts dealer refused to sell me a battery that was supposed to fit a diesel 4runner. He said that as mine was an import it would more than likely have different electrics and i could damage various parts.

Yet looking through this forum, the overriding opinion is fit as big as you can (but no-one seems to offer specific recommendations!)

The existing battery has the code 115D31R - does anyone know how this relates to uk/euro battery codes?

Or can someone recommend an actual battery? please don't just answer as big as possible - thats meaningless to me or whichever shop i go to!!

thanks

[Morr]

The first thing you need to do is find a carparts place staffed by someone who actually knows something about cars!

As long as the terminals are connected correctly, ie positive to positive etc, you cannot do any damage to your vehicle,

Any decent motor factors should be able to supply you with a suitable battery just by examining the vehicle. Once it physically fits in the tray (and anything baring a truck battery should), has the terminals in the correct locations as per the original one to enable easy connecting, and is of course 12v then it will work.
How well it will work and for how long will depend on the capacity of the battery, it is in this respect that the general advice is to fit as large a battery as possible. IIRC 720CCA is the reccomended figure, CCA= Cold Cranking Amps, altough you can get away with less, my twin batteries provide me with a total of around 650 CCA IIRC.

While some of these details may be meaningless to you, if they also appear meaningless to to guy trying to sell you parts, find another vendor.

[paulh]

It's time that these places hired staff that knew what they were talking about. I went to a large car spares in Rotherham today and asked if they had any high power H4 headlight bulbs, the answer I got was yes-H7.
THE MIND BOGGLES

[TonyN]

I don't know what the codes mean, but our local carpart place cross-referenced the numbers on our Jap batteries easily, they are standard industry numbers.

You must have gone in the sweet shop by mistake!!!

[openback]

don't think you can have too much power, my omptima's give around 830cca each. as to weather they're worth it jury is still out, see the earlier thread!

[da SLUG man]

had a look at mine, it's a bosch asia silver 570cca

does the trick

got it cheap from costco

[lightningad]

well i ended up getting one from Halfords. 650cca - couldn't find any higher without having to commit a crime to buy it. And i have not had a problem starting it yet, but then i did only get it yesterday! And it was reduced a bit in the sale.

[Rob]

Anything over approx 550CCA is fine. The 115D31R was not the factory spec battery, it should have been 80D26R. Not that it matters, it just means someone installed a larger capacity battery in the past. The 115D31R was 31cm long, the 80D26R is 26cm long. The little plastic battery trays are sized for a 26cm battery, larger batteries will hang over the sides but it doesn't matter.