This 2009 Chevrolet Impala came in the shop for some routine work and in completing those tasks I noted that the battery went dead within ten minutes of having the ignition on. A good battery would have been able to crank the engine if the key had been left on for thirty minutes to an hour. For the sake of argument I did recharge the battery with a battery charger and properly load tested the battery even though I was 99 percent sure it was no good.
Changing the battery in this vehicle can be a little bit of a pain, but in reality it is not that hard.
The first step is to remove the diagonal cross brace. There are three attaching bolts. All have 13 mm heads. There is one at the rear of the brace.
Two at the front.
Once the brace is loosened it can be rolled over so that access to the wiring harness retainer can be gained. Using a tool similar to the one I am using makes the job easier but it is not necessary.
The fuse junction block is attached to the strut tower by two 11 mm nuts that are screwed onto studs.
There is a latch that has to be lifted to remove the junction block cover.
The battery can most likely be changed without removing the junction block cover but I find that little bit of extra room helpful.
If you are like me and want to install a secondary battery to maintain system voltage, the cover needs to come off anyway.
Now that everything is mostly out of the way and the backup battery has been installed, it is actually time to start removing that battery. There is one 13mm headed bolt that secures the battery hold down bracket.
Both battery terminals have 10mm nuts securing the terminal clamps.
Care must be taken when removing the positive cable since it is hot and will be during the entire process. Remember the secondary battery that was installed to maintain voltage and system memory?
Note two things in the following picture. The red cover is protecting the positive battery terminal end that has been positioned out of the way. Also I rotated the battery to line up with angled portion of the radiator support panel. Doing this allows the battery to be picked up and out of the car relatively straight.
In the process of installing the new battery there are a couple of small things that I like to do. First is to clean out the debris from under the battery. I normally just use a shop vac and vacuum it out. I also apply a small amount of anti seize grease to the hold down bolt.
I also like to put just a little bit of grease under the the tapered lip of the terminal nuts. The nut does not need to be removed to do this. I removed just so I could show how the lower surface of the nut is tapered. This tapered edge work as a lever to tighten the terminal onto the battery post.
When re installing the junction block it is important to slide the lower tab into the slot in the inner fender panel or shock tower.
And there is a successfully installed genuine ACDelco replacement battery.
