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Austria, Vienna
1 Level
745 Review
38 Karma

Review on πŸš— 12V Car Battery Tester - TOPDON BT600, Cranking and Charging Tests, Alternator Load Testers, 100-2000CCA Digital Battery Voltage Tester, 3.5" Screen with Built-in Printer by Jhon Clark

Revainrating 5 out of 5

The fit and finish inspire confidence.

Some reviews for this product come from people who have experience with TopDon products and clearly love them. I do not belong to this group so I will only report on how the unit works/not working, build quality, looks etc. The BT600 comes with a built in thermal printer to provide the customer with a printed battery status report. ; a selling point, but how often will you actually use it? I believe it will be used; if for no other reason, then simply because it is. This unit is equipped with 5.9 foot battery cables, sufficient to operate the tester inside the vehicle when the battery is near the driver's side firewall. This is advantageous when carrying out the initial test, since it can be carried out by one person. On some older vehicles, such as 1996 Crown Victoria, where the battery is located at the front right of the engine compartment, the cables are too short and you may need the help of a second person. - Vehicle functions. Another benefit of the BT600 is free lifetime software updates. That sounds good; but how long will they keep updating this product? And what exactly are the updates aimed at? Are there bugs that need squashing? Or are these updates just to add more features? The BT600 has a different shape than most other devices, being wider than it is tall and thick enough that you can hold it with two hands. This tends to give it a more professional look than other battery testers you may want to buy. The counter has fairly thick rubber to protect it in the event of a fall, which is a good thing since most of us have dropped at least one thing in our lives. The screen is quite large for such a meter and the information is presented tastefully and rather factually. The use of color is subtle and perfect for this device. The printout is formatted in the same way as the display and is also very factual. How about its accuracy? The manufacturer's specifications claim approx. 99.5%. You can hardly expect more from a device in this price range. The BT600 comes with a carrying case large enough to carry the meter, cables, instruction manual and spare paper rolls for the printer. The people at TopDon were successful. Like other battery testers, it performs three types of tests: battery test, start-up test, and charge test. I disconnected the battery cables from my 1996 Crown Vic and ran a battery test. Results: Good charging Charge: 19% Voltage: 12.11V Operating time: 69% Measured: 705 CCA Rated: 850 CCA Type: Common Flooded Internal resistance: 4.25 mΞ©. How did I get all this information while doing this review? Well I used the printer to print. Not required, but kind of nice. I didn't do any cranking or charging tests as I'm testing how well the battery holds a charge when not connected to the car. I'm curious because when it's plugged into a vehicle it's completely dead after a few weeks and I want to know if it's a battery or a car. I don't know if a battery tester can 100% predict every kind of impending failure. I recently had a work truck that I needed to bridge a few times a week but every time I took it to AutoZone, Advance Auto etc and checked the battery it had enough charge to start it and the report said always the battery is good. It eventually got to the point that every time I turned it off it had to restart, so I just told them to change the battery. This fixed it. Could this tester tell me it's a bad battery? I will never know For the overall quality and functionality I have to give the BT600 five stars. It's a solid gauge that performs as you'd hope it would.

Pros
  • Absolutely amazing!
Cons
  • Not bad, but...