These days, many Grand California owners are experiencing one or two nasty surprises… The days are getting longer, the temperatures higher, so there’s nothing better than going on a tour with your beloved Grand California. Quickly awakened from hibernation and off you go, right?
Disillusionment sets in, the body or starter battery is completely flat, and you’ve just turned off the battery switch in the technology cabinet… By now you know that the control units in the vehicle consume power and simply switching them off in the equipment cupboard is not enough.
You don’t want to or can’t leave the vehicle connected to shore power for the entire winter? But you still want to know how the batteries in your vehicle are doing? We have a small but nice gadget for you.
The Battery Guard
The company Intact offers a small Bluetooth module which is connected directly to the battery, simply to the plus and minus pole.
Once the Battery Guard is connected, the vehicle’s battery powers the small module. Using the appropriate smartphone app, you can connect the Battery Guard to your phone and access the battery data.
All you have to do is enter the serial number on the back of the Battery Guard in the app and the app will establish a connection. In the second step, you select the battery type. In addition to AGM, lithium batteries are also supported.
Once you have completed these steps, you should be able to see the current charge level of the battery. In the app settings, you can be automatically warned as soon as the battery reaches or falls below a certain charge level. Of course, this only works as long as the app is open in the background on your smartphone and you are within Bluetooth range. But that can be enough if the vehicle is parked in front of your door or on the street. For example, if you set an alarm so that the app notifies you as soon as the battery is only 30 percent charged, you have enough time to either connect the vehicle to shore power or go for a drive.
Another great feature is the data storage on the Battery Guard. The internal memory can store the battery data from the last 72 days. If you reconnect to the Battery Guard after 14 days, for example, diagrams are available in the app. There are curves for the SoC (State of Charge), the temperature and the voltage. This allows you to track exactly when a lot of power is being consumed.
You can find the Battery Guard in our store:
