With numerous cars, I often have the issue of one not starting, mainly due to it being left for way too long without being fired into life.
Jump packs come in many shapes and sizes, often the smaller the better, and the Energizer 50806 is on the dinkier side of things. Thankfully.
What is it?
It’s a 9,000 mAh battery pack with the capability to jump start cars up to 4.0 litres in size for petrol, or 3.0 litres if it’s a diesel.
But it can also charge your phone or tablet with the single 2.4 amp USB output socket. You charge the pack via a micro USB input, so from the mains, or your 12v socket in your car. Handily they give you a USB car charger which charges at the quicker rate of 2.1 amp.
There’s also a single LED light that you can turn on by pressing the power button twice. It takes around 3 hours for the pack to charge from empty, and it’s recommended to top up it up every 3 months.
In terms of size it measures in at just 14cm long, 8.5cm wide and 2cm deep.
How?
Like a normal external battery pack you can carry it around with you, or take it on holiday to charge your devices when they’re running low.
Obviously, it has the addition of being able to jump start your car. To do this you plug in the EC5 connector, then a super bright green LED will flash telling you the pack is charged and ready to go.
Hook up the clamps and the LED will then turn solid green, meaning you’re ready to turn the key and jump the car.
You don’t have to worry about blowing the thing up, it has overcharge and cross polarity protection, although there’s no replaceable fuse in the EC5 connector as we’ve seen in other packs. Maybe it just doesn’t need one?
What’s it like?
What we loved about the Energizer jump start pack is the size. It just looks like any other external battery pack, it weighs in at just under 500 grams so you can easily chuck it in a rucksack when travelling, equally it doesn’t take up any room at all in your glovebox. There are some fairly hefty jump start battery packs on the market, that just aren’t suitable to be used everyday.
It’s easy enough to keep the EC5 jump start connector with you in the car at all times, and it’s the only pack we’ve reviewed that comes with a car charger. The only slight gripe would have been to make it a twin port USB affair, giving you the ability to power up your phone as well as the pack whilst on the go.
The car we revived this time was the Clio Trophy, it had been sat for a little while without much use over the summer months and the battery had enough juice to get the dash working, but any more than that and it simply gave up.
Hooking up the connectors the green light lit solidly, I jumped in the driving seat, turned the key and voila! Back in business.
Something we haven’t mentioned is the all metal body of the pack, it feels high quality and is the only battery pack with a metal body we’ve tested. The majority of them are encased in plastic.
Where can I get one?
Your best bet is to buy one from good old Amazon, currently it’s on sale at £89.99 which may seem steep when battery packs with just over double this capacity are around £34 these days, but they don’t have the ability to keep your car on the move.
The Energizer 50806 makes perfect sense if you have an older car, especially during winter time. It saves the faff of finding a neighbour, digging out jump cables and then being late for work on those chilly winter mornings.
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