I have recently had a few warning messages flash up on the dash including "Transmission fault" and "Reduced performance" (or words to that effect). I have also noticed a few occasions when after starting, the sat nav screen freezes on the "Land Rover" welcome screen.

I have just had the car serviced with no issues flagged up but could they all be a symptom of an ageing battery?
The car starts fine, albeit a tiny bit labored on the freezing cold mornings lately.

Can help thinking the battery must get a caning at this time of year what with heated screen, heated seats and all the other electrical demands associated with winter.

Any thoughts please?

Got a ATS garage to do a free test and they were honest enough to say it was low on charge but just needed topping up with a good run.
Issue is with these cars is they take a lot of power and my car gets long runs so my advice would be get it checked by a honest garage and if just low use a battery conditioner this time of year.

Once blew an alternator after getting into a car left in really cold conditions for a month so it can be expensive (cost me a battery as well) to not keep them in a best charged up condition.

Nordic countries have power points in residential car parks for water heaters linked in to the cooling system , good idea and used to be sold/made in UK years ago by a Leeds Company called BRAY. We fitted then to some Jags way back when. FL2 MY10 TD4 GS traded in at 2 years
FL2 MY13 TD4 GS Current

if it's the original battery then it's 8 years old, so maybe struggling a bit now.

Iain

I replaced mine earlier this year for the same reason, getting random faults showing up on a cold start and lots of "comms error" faults showing up on diagnostics. The car seemed to crank over quickly enough and started OK but the slightly lower voltage during cranking was causing the faults, a new battery solved the problem completely.

Quote:

....Can help thinking the battery must get a caning at this time of year what with heated screen, heated seats and all the other electrical demands associated with winter.

The extra earth strap is a good move too.

Chap up the street blew his Disco alternator yesterday, he was messing around with the battery a week ago. Car has done 90,000 miles and is around 8 years old so with this cold weather something has had to give once his battery got critical as was my case several years ago on a Berlingo (top of the range with top boxes, 2 litre engine and a car I should have kept longer, so practical). I will be on the look out for a battery in year 5 as its cheaper than an new alternator as well, would hope to pick one up after this Winter when demand is slacker.

Reminiscing about the Berlingo, I seem to remember when top gear was relaunched several years ago the first road test/report of any car was Clarkson in a Berlingo. He gave it loads of praise and went onto say only one car in the World had better suspension and that being a Rolls Royce. Quite some praise but like me he had just done a booze run and boy you could get some wine in her.  FL2 MY10 TD4 GS traded in at 2 years
FL2 MY13 TD4 GS Current

Yes, great vehicle, we had the Peugot equivalent, used to drive up and down to Catalonia in it with the rottweiler in the back( Spanish customs in Andorra were not too keen on him!) Bring loads of wine back, good 2 ltr engine that you eat up the miles with. MY 2013 SD GS Auto

Thanks for the replies, I will get the battery load tested and take it from there.

Yorky Bob wrote:

Chap up the street blew his Disco alternator yesterday, he was messing around with the battery a week ago. Car has done 90,000 miles and is around 8 years old so with this cold weather something has had to give once his battery got critical as was my case several years ago on a Berlingo (top of the range with top boxes, 2 litre engine and a car I should have kept longer, so practical). I will be on the look out for a battery in year 5 as its cheaper than an new alternator as well, would hope to pick one up after this Winter when demand is slacker.

Reminiscing about the Berlingo, I seem to remember when top gear was relaunched several years ago the first road test/report of any car was Clarkson in a Berlingo. He gave it loads of praise and went onto say only one car in the World had better suspension and that being a Rolls Royce. Quite some praise but like me he had just done a booze run and boy you could get some wine in her.

I've got a bingo multispace 2.0HDI superb vehicle

And funny enough I'll be putting a new battery on the freelander this weekend as mine is slow to crank over in this weather