Car batteries & battery replacement, Townsville.
Car, 4WD, truck, bus, motorcycle, golf cart, marine and heavy machinery batteries — stocked at the Townsville workshop, and fitted in store if you want it done.
We test before we sell you anything, because a tired battery and a failing alternator look identical from the driver's seat and only one of them is fixed by a new battery. SSB, Fusion Lithium and Eco Battery on the shelf, plus Victron chargers — from small-car batteries through to 51V lithium cart kits — and your old battery leaves with us for responsible disposal.
- Battery and charging system tested, not guessed at
- SSB Automotive Gold, Truck & Tractor and AGM deep cycle in stock
- Fitted in store if you want it done
- Old battery taken away and disposed of correctly
- Lithium deep cycle for touring, caravans and boats, and lithium upgrades for golf carts
The work, in detail.
Car & 4WD batteries
From SS36 small cars to SS88 V8 4WDs — SSB Automotive Gold, Automotive Silver, iStart for stop-start vehicles, plus HVT DryCell AGM where a four-wheel drive is carrying accessories. Matched to your vehicle, including whether it has stop-start.
Truck, bus & commercial
SSB Truck & Tractor and Truck Silver, commercial-grade with proper terminal layouts and vibration tolerance. Fleet and bus batteries are worth replacing as a set rather than one at a time — a new battery paired with a tired one is dragged down to the tired one's level.
Heavy machinery & earthmoving
Excavators, loaders, tractors and gear that lives on corrugations. High cold-cranking amps and vibration-rated cases, because a machine battery fails from being shaken apart long before it fails from age.
Lithium deep cycle
Fusion V-LFP lithium from the small V-LFP-12-6 up to 300Ah. Lighter than lead acid, with more of the rated capacity usable. Caravan and 4WD touring is where these earn their keep.
Golf cart & EV batteries
GC12V150Ah flooded, or Eco Battery Gen 3 lithium 51V kits with built-in BMS, charger and state-of-charge meter. Twelve-year pro-rata warranty on the lithium.
Marine & deep cycle
MF50D / MF70D series, Fusion AGM CBC range. SSB describe their deep-cycle batteries as vibration resistant, in ABS cases.
Motorcycle & ATV
The SSB Powersport range — Conventional, XR and High Performance Lithium. Give us the make and model and we'll match the size.
Testing, charging & charging faults
Carbon-pile load test and a check of the charging system, so you find out the battery's real condition and what life is left in it. A battery that is flat but sound gets recharged rather than replaced — and if the charging system is what flattened it, that is the actual repair.
What battery does my vehicle take?
There is no single answer to it. Four things decide which battery a vehicle needs, and getting any one of them wrong means a battery that will not fit, will not hold down, or will not last the year.
Case size and terminal layout
It has to physically fit the tray and the hold-down clamp, and the positive terminal has to end up on the side the vehicle's cable actually reaches. Right capacity in the wrong case is still the wrong battery.
Cold cranking amps
How much current the battery can push to turn the engine over. A diesel needs a good deal more than a small petrol engine, and undersizing here is why a battery that seems fine in the driveway will not start a cold engine.
Whether the vehicle is stop-start
Stop-start systems cycle a battery constantly and will chew through a standard flooded one. Those vehicles need a battery built for the duty — SSB iStart in the Super Start range — and fitting an ordinary battery instead is a false economy the car will punish.
What else runs off it
Fridges, winches, lights, inverters and touring setups draw well past starting duty. That usually means an auxiliary or deep cycle battery alongside the starting one, rather than asking a single battery to do both jobs badly.
Tell us the make, model and year — or bring the vehicle in — and we'll match it against the range. That runs from SSB Automotive Gold and Automotive Silver for cars, iStart for stop-start, HVT DryCell AGM for four-wheel drives, Truck & Tractor and Truck Silver for commercial, through to the Marine, Powersport and Golf Cart series.
A canopy fit-out, wired properly.
A Fusion V-LFP-12-100SL — 12 volt, 100Ah lithium iron phosphate, 1200 watt-hours, 16 kilograms — mounted flat to a carpeted panel in an alloy canopy, its state-of-charge display reading 89 per cent.
On the same panel: a REDARC unit, a Victron Blue Smart charger, an ARB air compressor with its tank, and fused distribution between them. That is a fit-out rather than a battery swap — everything mounted, fused and secured so nothing moves and nothing chafes.
The charging side matters as much as the battery. Lithium will not charge correctly straight off an alternator, which is why a lithium upgrade is a wiring job as much as a battery swap — and why the state-of-charge display is there, so you can see what you have left rather than guess at it.
Lithium deep cycle batteriesBatteries, stocked and fitted.
Stock on the shelf, installs that went out, and our stand at a field day. All Townlec's own photographs — no catalogue renders.
AGM or lithium? It depends on the job.
The answer is genuinely different depending on what the battery has to do. Neither one is the better battery — they are better at different things.
| Property | AGM | Lithium (LiFePO4) |
|---|---|---|
| Chemistry | Sealed lead acid | Lithium iron phosphate |
| Weight | Heavier | Lighter |
| Usable capacity | About half of rated | Nearly all of rated |
| Cycle life | Shorter | Considerably longer |
| Charging | Standard alternator or charger | Needs a lithium profile or DC-DC |
| Up-front cost | Lower | Higher |
| Best at | Starting an engine | House banks, touring, carts |
For starting a car or a truck, AGM is usually the sensible answer. For a caravan, a boat's house bank or a golf cart — anything that gets drained and recharged over and over — lithium is where the extra up-front cost earns itself back, provided the charging side suits it.
Signs your battery is on the way out.
Batteries rarely fail without warning. They fail after weeks of small symptoms nobody acted on — and then they fail in a carpark, in February, with the shopping in the boot.
- The engine cranks slowly, worst first thing in the morning
- Headlights dim at idle and brighten when you rev
- You've needed a jump start more than once
- The dash battery light stays on after start-up
- White or blue crust building up around the terminals
- Stop-start has quietly stopped working
- The battery is over three years old and has spent them in the tropics
Car won't start in Townsville?
The same symptom can come from the battery, the starter, the charging system or the wiring between them — and they all look alike from the driver's seat. We test before anything is replaced.
- Nothing happens when you turn the key
- A single click, then nothing
- Rapid clicking
- Slow, laboured cranking
- The starter whirrs but the engine doesn't turn over
- Dash lights flicker or die when you try
Got any of these? Come see us and we'll test it.
Why people bring batteries to us.
We test before we sell
Specialised testing equipment for accurate diagnosis of starting and charging problems — so the thing you leave with is the thing that was actually wrong.
The right battery for the job
Expert advice on choosing for the intended use. A boat, a bus and a stop-start hatchback need three genuinely different batteries, and the cheapest one that physically fits is rarely any of them.
Quality brands, fair price
High-quality replacements and upgrades from reputable brands at a fair price. Tropical heat and corrugated roads are hard on any battery, so the brand matters.
Fewer breakdowns
Catching a failing battery or a charging fault on the bench is the difference between a job you booked and a tow you didn't.
Disposal handled properly
Environmentally sound disposal of your old battery, start to finish. Our technicians handle the whole process, because an old battery does not belong in a bin.
An Australian-owned battery brand
SSB publishes itself as an Australian-owned manufacturer and distributor with locations nationwide. That matters at the point a battery fails inside its warranty term and somebody has to stand behind it.
Batteries across North Queensland.
Batteries are stocked at the Townsville workshop and at the Cairns branch, and go out across the North Queensland catchment — Ayr, Charters Towers, Bowen, Ingham, Mareeba and out to Mount Isa. If the battery turns out to be a symptom rather than the fault, the auto electrical side of the business is in the same building as the Townsville workshop.
Battery questions, answered.
Where can I buy a car battery in Townsville?+
Will you test my battery?+
How long does a car battery last in Townsville?+
Can you recharge my battery instead of replacing it?+
Can you fit the battery for me?+
My car needs a jump start every morning. Is that the battery?+
My car won't start and I can't drive it in. What are my options?+
Can I upgrade my caravan to lithium?+
Do you take my old battery?+
Do you do truck, fleet and machinery batteries?+
Not sure whether it's the battery or the alternator? That's exactly what the test is for.