Ours works perfectly every single time. Can't say I love it or hate it, but what I do love is the peace and quiet whilst waiting at traffic lights.

Bonus too, is the reduction in pollution at busy junctions.

For those reasons alone, it would be wonderful if every vehicle had it.

Mick.

frupi said:

You can just press the S/S button in and it will disable the S/S function for as long as you want, you don't even have to press it in every time you switch on/switch off the car. That's what we do now. I'm not a fan of S/S either, in fact, I absolutely loathe it and I'm so glad it isn't fitted to my Saab. Of course, the Fiat 500 S/S system would be great if it worked as reliably as Peugeot's S/S system (experience here, my works van has it fitted and it works all the time, every time!) but I still hate it lol!

Click to expand...

One time disable is in 2013 model, mine is 2012 and i have to disable ss every time i start the car.
I hate it now and i will hate it much more when i will have to pay extra to buy a special battery. i dont live in europe where ss is common and batteries like that are cheap.. At least in the hot climete here battaries last for 8 years, but sometimes thy fail sooner, i hope after i sell the car lol

Come off it Mick! It doesn't get busy in the Tamar Valley! I live right next to the M1 and believe me, that is busy lol!

liorwohl said:

One time disable is in 2013 model, mine is 2012 and i have to disable ss every time i start the car.

Click to expand...

Fair enough, I wasn't aware of that. Ours is a 2013 model but was built in November 2012, so I'm guessing your car may even be a 2011 build.

frupi said:

Come off it Mick! It doesn't get busy in the Tamar Valley! I live right next to the M1 and believe me, that is busy lol!

Click to expand...

Oh yeah?

Try it through the village of Gunnislake every morning and every evening! The traffic backs up at the traffic lights at both ends - sometimes all four roads - frequently. There's the bridge over the Tamar which causes tailbacks too. A390 is a very busy road at peak times I can assure you.

Further up though St Ann's Chapel and Delaware the traffic clogs up as well.

If you live near a motorway junction you know full well about vehicles backed up at traffic lights 24/7. We don't have it like that, I grant you, but believe me, you don't have a monopoly on busy roads.

All those engines ticking over ........................ noise and pollution.
Yes, S/S is a good thing. It can be annoying to the driver but it's worth it IMHO.

Regards from the Tamar Valley
Mick.

liorwohl said:

One time disable is in 2013 model, mine is 2012 and i have to disable ss every time i start the car.
I hate it now and i will hate it much more when i will have to pay extra to buy a special battery. i dont live in europe where ss is common and batteries like that are cheap.. At least in the hot climete here battaries last for 8 years, but sometimes thy fail sooner, i hope after i sell the car lol

Click to expand...

You can have the SS software updated so it will stay off like later cars

Lol Mick, you can't BS a BS'er! I was born in Plymouth and I grew up in the SW and I know what it's like both sides of the Tamar and trust me, if you had to put up with what we do every single day (you should see the M1 at 4 o'clock on a Monday morning on the Derbyshire/South Yorkshire border, it would make your eyes pop!), then you'll know just how lucky you actually are living where you live.

I'd move back tomorrow, but like most of the extremely hard working Eastern European folk who live and work near me, I'm as much of an economic migrant as they are, in my case, priced out of my own spiritual County. So I guess I'll have to thank all of those people who do religiously use their S/S systems saving me from some of the pollution. I probably wouldn't be so narked with our own if it was actually any good!

Regards from a highly toxic polluted area next to the most famous motorway in the world!

Mercky said:

You can have the SS software updated so it will stay off like later cars

Click to expand...

As far as i know this also cant be done in 2012 model

Famous motorway?
I remember the FIRST motorway ......... it predates the M1.

Preston Bypass December 1958.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preston_By-pass

As a six year old, I remember very well the excitement of it all and queuing up to get ON and then hurtling up at the heady speed of maybe as much as 60mph, then coming to a dead stop at the other end and queuing up to get OFF. Can't remember the car we had though, maybe a Ford Popular, dad had a few of them over the years.

As for Stop/Start, I had no idea that the 500TA we were buying actually had it until I drove it for the first time. It worked, but it wasn't long before I realised it didn't work very well. I joined this forum for advice and the only advice was "Get a new battery!"

I tried everything. Charging the battery frequently, disconnecting and charging, disconnecting the battery overnight .......... anything to not buy a battery.

The car was annoying to drive with the S/S energised, so I can understand why people don't like it. Ours cannot be changed, so if you don't like S/S you have to switch it off each time you start up. Other than that, you disconnect the seatbelt because that stops it.

In the end, I bit the bullet and bought a battery and never looked back. It works perfectly and is not a problem because it works as it should. The old battery is now in our Clio and works perfectly too as it's a non S/S car.

Greetings from a wet and dismal Tamar Valley,
Mick.

Mick F said:

Famous motorway?
I remember the FIRST motorway ......... it predates the M1.

Preston Bypass December 1958.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preston_By-pass

Click to expand...

Lol! No one remembers that :yeahthat: Unless of course you're old

Lol, Frupi and Mick... Remind me of this:

I'm not old, I'm only 62!

Brought up in Wigan from Lancastrian heritage, joined the RN at 16 going on 17, met my wonderful lady whilst on leave back home, married and moved to Portsmouth, then Scotland, had two daughters, moved to Plymouth, moved back to Scotland, bought a house, sold it and moved back to Plymouth, then bought a house in Gunnislake in the Tamar Valley, and left the RN aged 43.

Been here for thirty years and you wouldn't get me back Up North for all the tea in China.

Cars?
Mini Van
Triumph Herald
Humber Sceptre
Hillman Hunter
Hillman Imp
Hillman Imp
Mini
Talbot Samba
Talbot Horizon
Mini Van
Peugeot 205 (Diesel)
Mini (Clubman Estate)
Mini (1400cc 100bhp)
Mini (Same engine as above)
Mini Clubman Estate
Mini
Renault Clio
Fiat 500TA

TTFN
Mick.

Andy Monty said:

No as it will boil a standard battery the alternator on ss cars pushes a much higher ampage for fast charging

Click to expand...

Maybe not. I'm running a normal battery in my S/S 500. In order to fit the standard battery tray it's physically the same size as the OEM, but it's Ah capacity is double that of the stock S/S battery. Moreover, if you don't use stop start the alt should have no reason to ramp up the amps. Starting a warm engine only takes an Ah or two out of my now 120Ah battery. Even with S/S, the alt doesn't ramp up any more than it did with a health OEM S/S battery. In any case, the IBS should be monitoring charge acceptance and regulating alt output accordingly.

NB: I didn't choose to fit the standard battery, but it's been working well.

liorwohl said:

As far as i know this also cant be done in 2012 model

Click to expand...

My 2012-built TwinAir remembers its S/S setting.

44sunsets said:

My 2012-built TwinAir remembers its S/S setting.

Click to expand...

Mine too.

Andy Monty said:

No as it will boil a standard battery the alternator on ss cars pushes a much higher ampage for fast charging

Click to expand...

Sorry, but this is not quite correct, a bigger alternator will not damage a battery. The battery will take the current it needs, up to the maximum the alternator will supply. SS cars have bigger alternators because the battery needs to be charged more often. A bigger alternator cannot force extra current into a battery. For the same alternator voltage a given battery will draw the same current regardles of alternator size. A SS battery is bigger to provide power when stopped and has modified construction / Chemistry to allow it to be more "deeply" discharged and repeated recharged. This chemistry change also means that the charging voltage may be higher. For example Yuasa recommend 14.8V compared to 14.4V for a normal (flooded cell) battery. This can cause overcharging and damage. If you have, or can borrow, a digital voltmeter you caan check the voltage on your car. After a run of 10 minutes or so, stop the car with the engine running and measure the voltage across the battery with the engine at fast idle (>1500 RPM). If it's over 14.5V you do run the risk of overcharging a standard battery.
Of course it may be cheaper to run that risk than to fit a SS battery.

Robert G8RPI.

g8rpi said:

Sorry, but this is not quite correct, a bigger alternator will not damage a battery. The battery will take the current it needs, up to the maximum the alternator will supply. SS cars have bigger alternators because the battery needs to be charged more often. A bigger alternator cannot force extra current into a battery. For the same alternator voltage a given battery will draw the same current regardles of alternator size. A SS battery is bigger to provide power when stopped and has modified construction / Chemistry to allow it to be more "deeply" discharged and repeated recharged. This chemistry change also means that the charging voltage may be higher. For example Yuasa recommend 14.8V compared to 14.4V for a normal (flooded cell) battery. This can cause overcharging and damage. If you have, or can borrow, a digital voltmeter you caan check the voltage on your car. After a run of 10 minutes or so, stop the car with the engine running and measure the voltage across the battery with the engine at fast idle (>1500 RPM). If it's over 14.5V you do run the risk of overcharging a standard battery.
Of course it may be cheaper to run that risk than to fit a SS battery.

Robert G8RPI.

Click to expand...

Thanks!

So now I need to know 3 more things to determine if my plan to disable ss with a cheaper battery will work:
1. What battery Mh a non-ss 500 twinair is using?

2. What is the Mh the computer check for in the battery before ss turn off the engine?
Is it lower then the number we have in 1?

3. Does the bigger starter motor the ss have (?) needs more power to start then what the smaller battery can provide?

g8rpi said:

For example Yuasa recommend 14.8V compared to 14.4V for a normal (flooded cell) battery. This can cause overcharging and damage. If you have, or can borrow, a digital voltmeter you caan check the voltage on your car. After a run of 10 minutes or so, stop the car with the engine running and measure the voltage across the battery with the engine at fast idle (>1500 RPM). If it's over 14.5V you do run the risk of overcharging a standard battery.

Click to expand...

This won't work on a TA as the alternator maintains 12.8v unless the SOC determined by the IBS is below it's preset threshold. The only way to ramp up the voltage on a healthy TA is to drive the car and measure output on over run. 14.8v only happens on overrun and with the brake pressed.

UFI said:

This won't work on a TA as the alternator maintains 12.8v unless the SOC determined by the IBS is below it's preset threshold. The only way to ramp up the voltage on a healthy TA is to drive the car and measure output on over run. 14.8v only happens on overrun and with the brake pressed.

Click to expand...

I can't comment on specifically on TAs as I don't have one. I do know batteries though. If the TA has an intellegent charging system then it won't overcharge a standard battery. My test still stands, as you are looking to make sure the alternator / charging system is not applying more than 14.4V for long periods once the battery is charged. 12.8V seems pretty low though, even the old alternators for cars with simple electrical systems used 13.8V.

liorwohl said:

Thanks!

So now I need to know 3 more things to determine if my plan to disable ss with a cheaper battery will work:
1. What battery Mh a non-ss 500 twinair is using?

2. What is the Mh the computer check for in the battery before ss turn off the engine?
Is it lower then the number we have in 1?

3. Does the bigger starter motor the ss have (?) needs more power to start then what the smaller battery can provide?

Click to expand...

1. I don't know what size battery is fitted, but ePer should tell you

2. The computer can't check Ah directly, it will just check the voltage over time when the engine is stopped by the SS and being discharged, and possibly the voltage during actual cranking. As the SS is off this should not be an issue.

3. Again I don't know t SS TA, but the starter motor is almost certainly physically larger. This does not mean more power per se, it's to do with duty cycle. A standard starter motor gets used once or twice per journey with time too cool down between. A ss engine does not need more power to turn it over (althought it may be turned faster, which does need more power) but is operated much more often and has less time to cool down. The duty cycle (on time /off time) is much higher. A bigger starter has thicker copper conductors that heat up less (I squared / R losses is the technical term) They take up more space hence a bigger starter.
The battery capacity (Ah) does not affect any of this, other than the number of starts that can be made with a full charge.

HTH,
Robert G8RPI.