Steps to Revive Your Car’s Dead Battery (Automatic Transmission Edition)

In case your new secondhand car’s engine won’t start due to a dead battery or for other reasons, you can try to jump-start your vehicle. If your ride has an automatic transmission system, then best try applying the Series Method, which involves jump starting your car’s dead battery with another car’s functional one.

Instructions

● Park the rescue vehicle facing the stalled one and take the keys out of the ignition of both vehicles.
● Open the hoods of both cars and locate their respective batteries. Identify the positive and negative terminals of each battery. Then prepare the jumper or booster cables and take note of the color coding of the cables and clamp.
● Clamp one red cable to the dead battery at its positive terminal before connecting the other end of the booster cable to the rescue battery’s positive terminal.
● Clamp one black cable to the negative terminal of the rescue battery. Then clamp the other end to any unpainted metal surface of the stalled vehicle.
● Start the engine of the rescue vehicle and gently press on the gas pedal to charge the dead battery. Do this for about one minute.
● Start the engine of the stalled vehicle and gently press the gas pedal to charge the battery. Do this for about two minutes.
● After the battery is recharged, take off the cables in this order:

○ Positive terminal of the dead battery.
○ Positive terminal of the rescue battery.
○ Negative terminal of the rescue battery.
○ Negative terminal of the stalled vehicle.

But Before You Proceed

You need to keep in mind a few things before trying the Series Method to jumpstart your pre-owned car’s dead battery, including the following:

● The Series Method is a very effective way to jumpstart a vehicle’s dead battery. However, its name is quite misleading. You must connect the batteries in “Parallel” arrangement instead of in “Series.”
● Don’t try doing the Series Method on your own unless you and the rescue car’s owner are both sure of what you’re doing. Otherwise you could end up draining the rescue battery as well (this usually happens if the Series Method is done without running the engine).
● Or worse, you could accidentally electrocute yourselves or have the batteries explode (sometimes, a sudden surge of electricity flows to the electrical system when jump starting a vehicle).

Call Your Mechanic

As you can see, jumpstarting the dead battery of an automatic transmission vehicle is simple yet dangerous. So if you don’t know how to do the Series Method properly, then best leave it to your trusted mechanic.