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Any brand names ?
I am really in the dark here.
I heard two conflicting opinions several months ago.
I should have listened to the pessimist.
Is a battery from...
- An auto parts store
- A car care center
- Wal-Mart
- A mechanic's garage/repair shop
...about equal to all the others ?
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buy a name you've heard of,
buy the "middle of the range" model - even 'brands' will OEM entry level from the cheapest supplier,
buy something with a warranty from a better shop / chain, not the $1 store.
(yeah sure, a "5 year warranty" will never stack up, but from a better shop they would at least honor - likely instant replacement - for a bad egg bought in the last few weeks.)
pestilence [ pes-tl-uh ns ] noun
1. a deadly or virulent epidemic disease. especially bubonic plague.
2. something that is considered harmful, destructive, or evil.
Synonyms: pest, plague, CCP
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The battery bank I bought is no longer on Amazon, its an "Arteck Car Jump Starter Auto Battery Booster and 8000mAh External Battery Charger".
If you google you will find lots of similar products, really worth having in the car and topping up every month or so to save you that time when you are late at work and your car won't start when you just want to get home or for helping a colleague at work who has a flat battery.
In terms of multi-meters I have a UNI-T UT30(N15BY) and a UNI-T UT210E clamp meter - probably best not to use on your executive jet but they are fine on cars.
There are plenty of youtube videos on how to use a multimeter to check your car battery.
In terms of buying a new battery an auto parts store is probably a good place to get a battery from.
If your battery is less than 5 years old it probably does not need replacing.
A couple of things to note - listening to the radio/music in the car at lunch while the engine is off will drain the battery as I recently discovered...
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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I konked out mine due to 2 months total lockdown in Italiakistan and laziness on my part - always said "I go down and keep the engine running for half an hour... tomorrow". Got me a nice 5.7V battery. Had to order a battery charger from Amazon, 40 hours later (it's a 44 Ah battery, it recovers the battery from low charge, charges at 2A and then desulfates) battery was alive and more kicking than ever.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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In general lead acid batteries for cars lasts five to seven years.
A battery that's always kept fully charged lasts a lot longer, so don't sit in the car listening to music for a prolonged time without charging it afterwards.
Long drives are better than short drives. Lots of short drives don't allow for fully recharging the battery after the starter engine drains it.
If you let the car stand without getting driven for a longer time you should buy a charger that can trickle charge the battery, especially in the winter. (a proper charger that is, not a rectified transformer)
Don't buy el cheapo no-name batteries, unless you're selling the car. 
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Little secret - most batteries are made by one manufacturer, and the different companies just slap their labels on them.
I use the best batteries available at walmart. I'm a car guy, so if there was really a difference, I'd know it.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Good point! Actually, this applies to many products on the market, not just batteries.
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Such as magnetic tape.
Something like 20 years ago, when data storage on half-inch tape was the standard, the National Archives of Norway had bought a pile of tapes of a production batch turning out to be no good: Something had happended to the adhesive gluing the metal oxide to the backing, so the oxide started falling off. The Archive had prepared for that; they made two copies, of different brands of tape.
But the oxide started falling off those tapes as well! This other manufacturer normally produces his own tape, but it was revealed that they had had some problems with the production line, so to serve their customer's needs, they had bough tape from that first manufacturer, labeling it as their own. It turned out that this was from the same production batch.
This caused a major uproar in the European archival world - the Norwegian archives were far from the only ones experiencing these problems. I heard people say that although this was a serious blow to the image of the manufacturer of the faulty tape, it was just as bad for the image of the other one who had disguised faulty tape as his own. He appeared to be even less trustworthy, when you can't be sure that you get the quality he makes himself.
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A few years ago, it was revealed that one maker of childrens' clothes produced two different qualities, made by the same design, in the same colors etc. You had to have the alternative side by side, comparing the qualities of the clothes, the robustnes of the zipper, the quality of the seams... to see the difference. The cheap quality was marketed through discount stores selling the "same" clothes, of the "same" models and the same brand name, a lot cheaper than regular stores.
This went to court, and the manufacturer was ordered to make clearly visible distictions between the significantly different qualities. The end result was that the manufacturer dropped the "cheap" line. Discount stores still have lower prices than other stores, but not by far as much lower as they used to.
In the food business, there is lots of this, but the producers make cheaper, lower quality products to be labeled by the budget stores' label. Even if they are made in the same factory, the variants with more high-price labels are of a higher quality. I would think that the same applies to batteries: Even if some investigating jounalist reveals that they are from the same factory, that doesn't mean that they are of teh same quality. It would be like 'revealing' that a huge number of ARM based chips are produced by TSMC, but sold under dozens of brand names. So they are all equally good then, huh?
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In food, there is more variation in the quality of 'generic' products. Reasonably high quality big box retailers (e.g. Costco) not infrequently buy products of the same quality as (and/or identical to) the producer's Name brand for relabeling and can still sell them somewhat cheaper. The clue is in the 'somewhat': something sold at half the price of a brand name product is unlikely to be of the same quality.
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As previously stated, there are only a handful of actual battery manufacturers and the store brands are just re-labeled.
My Choice: I have no real brand loyalty and there aren't any that I have blacklisted
One of the limiting factors is the vast variety of sizes that have come up in the last few decades as cars and engine compartments have shrunk.
One problem is that some of these funky sizes only fit a couple of cars, so stores (either Walmart or local auto parts store) may not have them or there will be a price premium
My Choice: Try to get the correct size battery, some will have a secondary battery choice that is more common. You may need to shop around
Different batteries for my car have different power ratings; such as reserve time, cranking amps, cold cranking amps.
My Choice: Get the biggest numbers possible. Look up the specs and you will often find out this pick is also the heaviest. That is a good thing and says there is more lead in the plates which generally equates to longer life
Different warranties...
My choice really is not affected by this; the heaviest battery generally has the longest warranty
Other factors...
If you only plan on having the car for another year or so, it makes no sense to get one with a 10 year warranty
If you live in an arctic climate though... get the biggest baddest that you can
Director of Transmogrification Services
Shinobi of Query Language
Master of Yoda Conditional
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Make and model of the car? There are two main types of car batteries - flooded acid and AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat). Buy the biggest battery of the same type that will physically fit in the car. Do NOT buy an AGM if your car shipped with a flooded acid battery or vice versa - the two battery chemistries are incompatible when charging.
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The whole company does a Hour by hour, minute by minute logging into the timesheet.
I'm requesting, that I log all the work done, everyday. But the minute by minute marking is extremely cumbersome.
Is it a fair request?
modified 7-May-20 3:05am.
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In my company the sheet times you!
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Sounds like sheeting 
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lol I'm going to delete this message. Before one of the guys there sees it. I should control my office rant.
Edited 
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Minute 1 - Filling timesheet.
Minute 2 - Filling timesheet.
Minute 3 - Filling timesheet.
...
Minute N - Filling timesheet.
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Yes. Just log the time spent logging in its own record.
When my former company issued a clena and sanitized desk policy I spent one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening cleaning my desk. When sheets hit the fan and there was need of all the working time available, I followed the letter of the law. Got so far as to dismount every single keyboard key and clean it one by one.
Policy went down the toilet quite quickly.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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den2k88 wrote: I spent one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening cleaning my desk
If you cleaned your desk before leaving every evening, what happened overnight that required you to clean it again first thing in the morning?
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I followed the letter of the law.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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Gotcha. Do not discuss the logic of policies, or point out the lack thereof.
Been there, done that, learned that you have to pick your battles, and this is probably not one of them that's worth it.
Would anyone know any different if you didn't clean your desk in the morning?
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In Norwegian courts, there is a basic principle saying that the law should be interpreted according to the intentions of the lawmaker. Most cases taken to High Court is on law interpretation, where this principle is followed. There, you cannot argue about the letter of the law, if it contradicts the lawmaker's intention.
If there is any grain of truth (I know that must be a rather small one...) in Hollywood movies depicting US courts, the letter has a much stronger position and the intention a correspondingly weaker position. Now I do not believe that Hollywood courts are like real life courts. Yet there may be a tiny little grain of truth to it.
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In Italy it's a middle ground between them, because the interpretation power is held only by the legislator (aka the Parliament, or the local government body in case it's about a local regulament pertaining to them), and the magistrature, with limitation in this case: only our "Supreme Court" (Corte di Cassazione) may interpetate the law and their sentences are the only one which sets precedent. That's why Cassazione sentences are usually announced on many news outlet, because the last Cassazione sentence on one topic is pretty much the new definition of the law for that particular case - i.e. what constitutes defamation or mobbing, which insults can be liable of a lawsuit...
Usually if you respect the letter of the law in Italy it's enough, our laws are stupidly long and detailed to cover all the bases - they actually create all manners of loopholes, pitfalls, holes and contradictions.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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It's not about what you think is fair, it's about what the company needs to run its business.
If you're doing contract work and need to bill clients then you need fine grained reports so you can accurately bill.
If you're trying to debug processes and manage costs you need timesheets to understand where things are going off the rails and what bits to tackle first
If you're trying to keep an eye on employees to ensure they are actually working you need to have a good hard look at yourself and your operations.
We implement timesheets on very, very rare occasions in order to understand costs. Ultimately we need to know down to the 30 min mark, but we only need that for when someone is working on a specific client task. Someone may be doing a bunch of maintenance, or learning, or working on a new project, and that's fine. They then move on to a client specific task and for that we need the hours - but only for that.
So maybe you can negotiate a little better if you understand the need. Making it easier for employees (avoid garbage in / garbage out) and potentially improving the data for the manages could result in a win/win
cheers
Chris Maunder
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