Weirdness after Antigravity Battery Install with CTEK lithium charger

Finally got the battery installed.

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Took the opportunity to tape the bar on top for safety with harness tape. Should have cleaned the bottom of the battery holder, but maybe next time. I was running out of daylight. I also removed an extra generic CTEK charger hook up that the previous owner must have had. The car is a 2009 so the factory has the charger with the special connector on the passenger side.

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Yes I know I need to vacuum my carpet...

So I started the car after the install. I got the 60 Ah battery and wow the car starts up super fast. I have never heard a starter motor run so fast before and with such a sure kick to life for the engine.

Drove the car around, I even added their battery telemetry thing that send battery health to my phone over bluetooth. Stopped and started up no problem...

Then I parked the car in the garage and hooked up my new lithium battery tender from CTEK using the adapter for the OEM tender hookup. I obviously went to try the lock-out which on the factory "Ferrari Branded" CTEK charger put a battery symbol up in the cluster and won't let the car start. Well here is where the weirdness starts. The car won't start... Good. I don't get the battery signal, just a click in the back and then the F1 light comes on in the cluster. Won't go away even if I remove the tender connection. Once I start the car it goes away but then when I shut down and go to prepare to start the car it comes back until the car is actually started.

Grabbed my thinkdiag and when to look what codes there might be...
The CFC201 transmission recorded a code of P1755 Ignition Enabling Relay Driver.

I guess the new CTEK even with the adapter doesn't correctly lock out the ignition in the same way as the factory one.

Cleared the code and all is well.

So moral to the story. If you have a CTEK, not factory tender, with the adapter for the OEM tender on the newer F430s, if you go to start the car with it still plugged in, you may get an F1 error and have to clear it with something like a thinkdiag.

 

I know, it's weird. I didn't get the "battery" symbol in the cluster with the new adapter. The car just doesn't start and I get the F1 error. With the OEM tender plugged in, I get the battery symbol and it doesn't attempt to start. I bought the CTEK adapter about a year ago from someone selling them here, so it could be specific to the adapter I bought.

Do you have the pinout of the factory connector?

 

Was waiting to make sure everything worked before I cut them off. No return after that point.

 

OK, poking around I found this image...

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I'll grab a multi meter after work and check the adapter.

It also can be that the charger doesn't actually send +12 in a way that correctly triggers the ignition block. Not familiar with how lithium batteries charge, but if it's pulsed or something else it could be enough to block start but not trip all the different electronics needed to fully engage the "protection"

 

Yep it’s wired correctly. Checked it against the OEM one also.

I’m guess it’s something related to how lithium chargers work vs the standard CTEK tender.

 

Ok. Decided to do this as a more scientific test. So 2009 F430 with factory battery tender setup.

Case 1: battery symbol displayed when starting car is attempted.

- Optima Red top battery & Ferrari Branded battery tender not plugged into AC.
- Optima Red top battery & Aftermarket CTEK adapter (No tender attached)

Case 2: No battery symbol displayed when starting car is attempted but F1 error light appears till cleared.

- Antigravity Lithium Battery & Ferrari Branded battery tender not plugged into AC.
- Antigravity Lithium Battery & Aftermarket CTEK adapter (No tender attached)
- Antigravity Lithium Battery & Aftermarket CTEK adapter (lithium tender attached, but not plugged into AC)

So it appears to be something to do with the 12V supplied by the lithium battery doesn’t play well with the start lockout since the lockout is triggered by shorting the 12v to the correct pin on the oem tender connector on the car.







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I generally agree as an EE also if a lithium battery worked like a standard battery, but the lockout may be a multi-function magnetic relay and the BMS may be doing something funky like kicking into a low power mode which prevents the magnetic relay from working 100% correctly and completely blocking the startup.

 

Yes, the one in the Antigravity Lithium battery. That seems to be the only thing it could be since it works fine with a standard AGM battery.

 

Yes my OCD wants me to figure this out ;-)

It may have to wait till during the week as my son is driving the car to the “Hoboken Italian Festival” today with the Italian Cars & Cannoli group, but I’ll put an oscilloscope on the the connector when I can. I think that will tell us what is really going on. The weird part is lots of people have Antigravity batteries and I might be the 1st person to test the setup for lockout. I also realized I have the Antigravity “battery” monitor that is attached to the battery and is not in place when I use the AGM so there could be encoded signals in the 12v power to the lithium battery. The oscilloscope should help figure that out and it could be what is the route of the problem. Once I have an idea what is really going on I will discuss it with antigravity.