Boxster (986) flat battery

[onomatopoeia]

I normally use the Boxster as my daily driver, but for the last few weeks it has stayed in the garage. Consequently the battery is now flat, a fact I was alerted to when the alarm went off for no reason last night, and kept going off as I couldn't reset it. It did eventually stop, but had probably woken up the entire neighbourhood by then.

I can't open the front boot as the central locking won't disengage and it won't accept charge through the cigar lighter - I've tried the key out, key in and key in and turned to the ignition position and nothing allows current to flow. Having no better ideas and wondering how long I was going to be keeping the neighbours awake, I had the AA out for a "homestart", or at least one of the local garages they subcontract to and his rather better power pack also couldn't charge it through the cigar lighter. He was also unable to open the front boot.

So, how do I get the front boot open to charge the battery when I can't release the central locking? If anyone knows why the cigar lighter charging might not be working that would be a bouns.

[Magic919]

On the 996 you power the car via a terminal in the footwell fusebox. Maybe the Boxster is the same.

[speedyman]

Pull off the fuse box cover in the footwell. There is a large red terminal which pulls out. connect a charger to the terminal and an earth point on the car to charge the battery. Youtube video here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueTM60piA6k

Speedyman

[onomatopoeia]

Many thanks

[gemini]

Then buy a trickle charger to stop it happening again!

[onomatopoeia]

The pull out red supply post in the fuse box above the row of spare fuses is missing, and there's nothing in that space that could be pulled out. Looks like I'm going to be fishing around in the wheel arches for the manual cable release at the weekend.

Also need to sort out which fuse kills the alarm if it goes off again tonight, don't need that happening again. And trying to figure out why it won't take charge down the cigar lighter socket (fuse D5 is not blown, I checked).

[Porkupine]

onomatopoeia said:

The pull out red supply post in the fuse box above the row of spare fuses is missing, and there's nothing in that space that could be pulled out. Looks like I'm going to be fishing around in the wheel arches for the manual cable release at the weekend.

Also need to sort out which fuse kills the alarm if it goes off again tonight, don't need that happening again. And trying to figure out why it won't take charge down the cigar lighter socket (fuse D5 is not blown, I checked).

Can you charge it in that way? Never heard of that...

[onomatopoeia]

Porkupine said:

onomatopoeia said:

The pull out red supply post in the fuse box above the row of spare fuses is missing, and there's nothing in that space that could be pulled out. Looks like I'm going to be fishing around in the wheel arches for the manual cable release at the weekend.

Also need to sort out which fuse kills the alarm if it goes off again tonight, don't need that happening again. And trying to figure out why it won't take charge down the cigar lighter socket (fuse D5 is not blown, I checked).

Can you charge it in that way? Never heard of that...

I can't. Others on the internet have suggested you can, but it doesn't work on mine.

I got in by butchering a spare fuse and putting it in socket C3, then applying 12V from a spare battery to it. This lit up the dashboard and allowed me to release the central locking.

When I opened the front boot, the alarm went off at it's normal piercing volume, despite the flat battery. I thought I had disconnected my slave battery so wondered where the current to drive it was coming from, but am starting to doubt that now.

[gemini]

Trickle charge direct to battery has worked very well for my car