New Battery -- car NOW having an issue.

Bear with me, please.

For the past couple of months my husband has been back and forth to Colorado as his "baby sister" was extremely ill -- but this has come to a close as she died yesterday (good Mother's Day thing).

In the meantime, I have been trying to keep his Camry somewhat running, by starting it and driving it a couple of times per week. However, past couple of weeks, it seems to have been slow to crank.

Last night, all I got was "click, click, click" when I turned the key. Thanks to PriusChat member UART, I knew how to check with Voltmeter and got a 12.52 reading on the battery. I was confused, but hooked up charger and after about 10 minutes, it claimed it was fully charged. Still got "click, click, click" when I turned the key.

Jumped it from my Prius and it started right up. Called MY dad and he talked about "load" and some other issues, but said to get a new battery. Went to K-Mart (40 miles away and only store open) and put in a new DieHard Gold. Started right up last night (10:30 p.m.).

Drove car this morning and it was idling very low according to the tach. And it was, of course, idling rough. Drove it around for about 30 minutes or so, and by the end it seems to have smoothed out and is doing O.K.

After all that, my question -- and I do have one -- Did the car "lose" some memory and just need to relearn the "idle."

It is a 2003 Camry LE. I would like to get it fixed before my husband gets back at the end of the week, if it needs it. No check engine light. Is adjusting the idle on this thing easy?

Any help or insults would be appreciated, possibly.

 

Hey, JC, sorry, if I confused you. Brain not working so well today...anyway.

Car has about 145K.

Husband only allows Chevron Techron gasoline in the car for "clean" running.

Has always been trouble free. I know coincidence happens, but there WAS NO idle problem that I noticed until I put in the new battery. I did not "mess with" any other parts of the car when I changed the battery last night. I did put the negative charger clip on a large bolt on the engine block. But, other than that, I did not touch any other part of the engine area other than the battery and the clamps.

I suppose I should go out and drive it some more and see if the problem has disappeared....but just thought someone might know if there is such a thing as "losing" the idle speed memory when the battery is disconnected (maybe it sounds silly, but I thought I had "heard" somewhere that such things happen now with all the computerization).

 

Well, it was K-Mart, at 8:30 p.m. on a Sunday night. The OEM was a 26L. K-Mart had no 26L, but their book said a 35 was the best fit, but the 24F was an alternative -- the 24F had some 200 more CA, so went with it. Got it home and the voltmeter said it was at 12.58 (or close to that). So, I put it in the car and then put the charger on it before I did anything else and the charger immediately said it was at full-charge.

And, yes, no check engine light and no other dash warnings.

Finally, old battery was 11 years old and it had been showing signs of slow cranking the past few weeks -- indeed, I put a SECOND set of jumper cables in the trunk of the car last week just in case I was stuck somewhere where I needed the extra length....Air filter is about four months old

 

O.K.:

So, following leads/tips/opinions expressed here. And talking to my own mechanic on the phone, it appears that changing the battery does indeed cause the Camry to lose it's memory and "idle specs" go back to the factory default settings.

If the car was just off the boat from Japan, that would not be a problem, but with some 145K, apparently the consensus is that the throttle body is dirty and often times the car will finally adjust to that with a day or so of normal driving.

But, at times, you have to go ahead and clean the throttle body/IAC. And cleaning it is a good idea, anyway.

It looks like a big pain (I never have much luck trying to get those spring-loaded hose clamps off, I much prefer worm gear), but is "doable."

Not sure I want to tackle it at the moment. Our weather is supposed to change for the worse and I don't have an indoor repair area.

So, as a stopgap measure, I drove it to work and back today (some 90 minutes of driving), bought a can of SeaFoam, put it in the tank and let it idle in my driveway for 30 minutes. When I went out, it was idling pretty well. We will see.

Irregardless, in the next month or so, I plan to go ahead and clean the IACV/Throttle body.

At least the SeaFoam should help in injector issues.

Thanks Trollbait and JC for the help. Without your concern, I don't think I would have figured it out. Oh, I DID find one YouTube video that shows the procedure on my particular car, so that is a big help. Not sure I would try it without that video.

 

Just to wrap this up. When problem started, drove some 100 miles on both highway and surface streets with no improvement over two days.

Toward end of two days, dumped in 16 oz can of Seafoam and let Camry idle outside for some 30 minutes. When I went back out, the idle looked good. Drove to work today (third day) and idle was fine.

I will follow JC's good advice and clean the valve/body thing in the next couple of weeks, but for now, I am somewhat happy (just wish Toyota would warn about this in owner's manual).

 

Honestly, JC, I don't think the Seafoam did a darn thing other than lighten my purse by $6.49. But, I do think you are dead on about cleaning the throttle body and IACV.

Only thing, I figure when I do, I will have to go through that whole "bad idle" thing again until my car relearns about the clean valve and throttle body.