Checking the Battery

1 Use a voltmeter to check that a reading of at least 12.4 V is obtained across the battery terminals.

If the voltage is too low it indicates that the battery is either poorly charged or has insufficient capacity.

The state of charge in the battery should be checked. The most suitable way of doing this is to use a hydrometer. The specific gravity of the electrolyte in a fully-charged battery should be 1.28. A specific gravity of 1.18 corresponds to about 50% of a full charge.