CR1616 battery for key fob

[flip9]

Scratching my head on this one.

The CR1616 battery for my Suzuki Key remote (basic 2 button remote) is 4 years old so i thought id swap it out early. So i went out to Bunnings and bought an Energizer lithium. I put it in the remote and it doesnt work at all. The open voltage is reading 3.3v where as the nearly old one is closer to 3.0v

I tried it on the spare key remote aswell. Same results, only the older battery works

I thought maybe i somehow got fake battery so i bought another CR1616 from a different store but the results was the same

A couple of things i also tried:
-Cleaning & Bending the contact prongs
-Charging the car battery fully
-Checked for protective film
-Size looks identical

Any ideas on whats going on here? High internal resistance?

[coppercone2]

child safety bitterant? they don't work with all battery cavities.

look carefully under magnification for evidence of a thin plastic film. or lick it and possibly vomit (joke)

They put PVD coating with biterant on some cells so small children or animals do not swallow them. its a new thing


I had this happen. Then I got a newer revision of the same brand battery and it worked.

and, its hard to take off. Alcohol don't do it . Acetone aint do it. fiber scratch brush was still itermitant after it looked like shit. its a tough coating

the process is
1) some company makes new tech (battery industry has a few innovators and ALOT of copy cats)
2) others rush to meet new spec
3) company 1 made a error with placement or film durability and corrected it
4) company 2 slow to respond or gambles on it being OK for most things
5) chinese company dont know WTF is going on, sells knock offs that look the best without any knowledge of end use

[wraper]

Unless new batteries did not make electrical contact in battery socket, basically the only thing it can be is a very high internal resistance that won't show up by just measuring voltage with multimeter. nominal voltage of fresh CRxxxx batteries is 3.3V, BRxxxx variant a bit higher. No CR batteries come lower than that when fresh.

[coppercone2]

probes got through biterant but not the cavity contact.


put it in cavity and measure continuity lol. it drove me nuts


it needs to be really good surface for that piece of crap paper leaf spring to make contact with coin cell. coin cell cavities are kinda sad


my car remote takes apart where you can probe each contact to the battery, which let me find the problem. baffling

[wraper]

I didn't personally stumble on batteries with bitterant so was not aware of them but googling suggests they cause a bad contact issues quite often. So first try rubbing them with some solvent like alcohol or acetone to see if it helps with a bad contact, if it does not help., rub  with something that can remove it mechanically, with a rough side of a kitchen sponge, for example.

[coppercone2]

that shit is tough a fiber glass pencil would not remove it good enough to make good contact with keyfob even after it looked totally scratched up, and it was immune to IPA and acetone

they don't want it coming off in the package because of humidity and stuff, which would disable the safety mechanism

[coromonadalix]

have you tried cr2025 ??     in my suzuki remotes   its cr2025 ?? 2 buttons and the ones with transponders in them

[flip9]

Thanks for the ideas. I did use a cotton bud and alcohol to clean every contact point. Ill try lightly sand back the surfaces of the button cell.

have you tried cr2025 ??     in my suzuki remotes   its cr2025 ?? 2 buttons and the ones with transponders in them

The remote is for a 2018 Suzuki Swift AZ. Its similar style to the listing below except both my keys are suzuki genuine

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/115140923806

[Stray Electron]

   Have you compared the thickness of the new battery to the old battery?  I've seen a lot of imported coin batteries that were thinner than normal and also cylindrical batteries that were shorter than normal and they wouldn't make contact. Also some people have reported  fake Energizer batteries so it's possible that you have a fake one and that's too small to work properly. 

  To put the top down on my car, I have to hold the remote next to the IR receiver and hold the button on the remote down for 16 seconds while the top folds down. I just bought some imported CR2025 batteries for the remote and they will only complete that operation about four times before they're too weak for the receiver to pick up the signal and to begin the top down process.

[wraper]

I've seen a lot of imported coin batteries that were thinner than normal and also cylindrical batteries that were shorter than normal and they wouldn't make contact.

The problem probably was not with the batteries but with the device. I have quite expensive devices with battery holders that do not adhere to the AA battery dimension standard. Sage (Breville) blender vacuum pump and Homematic IP room thermostats. Vacuum pump had problems with eneloop rechargeable batteries as they have a slightly less protruding positive terminal than most of the alkaline batteries and battery body was pushing against plastic thingy so that positive contact was intermittent. Homematic on other hand makes high capacity eneloops and some other rechargeable batteries a bit hard to insert and extremely hard to remove (very tight fit) as they are a bit thicker than usual alkaline batteries. Usual eneloops also are harder to remove than Alkalines but not that bad. Looks like when designing the thing they just measured the diameter of some alkaline battery rather than adhering to the standard (eneloops are within a dimension spec).

[flip9]

Mystery solved. coppercone was spot on, it was indeed the coating.

Specifically the coating on the negative side. Light sanding with a nail file didnt work. I had to scratch the hell out of it with a flat head screwdriver till it was bare metal shiny

Both my remotes are now working with fresh batteries. Thank you all

[coppercone2]

rubberized abrasive of medium coarse grit would probobly work well for cleaning them with much less work

given the shelf life of batteries, and how they are stocked and sold somewhat irregularly, you are likely to see contact trouble for a while, if the manufacturers even got it totally sorted

its like the child safe bottle cap and the safety lighter

they don't like recalling batteries. They want the problem to get consumed if they have a problem. 

[jzx]

it was immune to IPA and acetone

Have you tried with water? If it tastes bitter, must be soluble in water (saliva).

[thedoc298]

I have had it happen several times over years, the bat is low even though it's 3volts. I put the bat in my mouth and check the voltage you will see 2.xx, or make a load, I found my lips work fine.

[coppercone2]

it was immune to IPA and acetone

Have you tried with water? If it tastes bitter, must be soluble in water (saliva).

I thought of that but it needs to be humidity resistant in the paper packaging AND well I don't wanna wipe down a coin cell, because its a lithium battery. I don't like the idea of water getting near the gasket. I thought potentially it can cause a leakage current or something (salt bridge?). It seems like one of those things that can cause a cell to explode

I don't think I would try anything less the 70% alcohol if wiped really well.