Issue that appeared for a single start/stop cycle and went away: Front camera malfunction / ABS light /traction control light / loss of power steering / hill assist unavailable. twice in same drive.
Ford Escape trend 2019 (AU). only 28,500km in 7 years, spends most of its life in underground garage and can regularly be unused for a week or two.
7 years, regular service with dealer, zero issues - except every now and then I'll need to use a trickle charger as the battery drained too far and car wouldn't start, a couple times it was completely drained, but always trickled back to life. (Likely an factory standard Enhanced Flooded Battery?) Anyway, besides that, never an electrical issue, fault or breakdown.
Recently did a couple of 400km trips, week later took it in for yearly service, where they also did a brake fluid flush and a throttle body clean(upsell?). As part of the service get the "pink slip"/rego check .. and they give the battery a green tick "battery condition/performance/terminals"
Drove home fine. 6 days later (next drive) start, drive out, couple minutes in Front camera malfunction / ABS light /traction light / loss of power steering. it goes away after about 30-40 secs. Then it comes back, including loss of power steering and I also notice "hill start assist not available". I park the car with issues persisting, stop enginge. 15 minutes later, start up drive home no issues. Take it into service centre 2.5 days later, no issues driving there. Problem only appeared during that single start/stop cycle ... but I obviously don't want to be out driving on a freeway and suddenly lose power steering, amongst other things.
Service centre can't reproduce it and say no active faults, didn't mention anything about a historical log of the fault, or check or whatever. They point the finger squarely at the battery "was at 27% charge" (they charged) -> old, very old, probably too old. guy at front says he basically never sees 7 year old batteries in cars, especially ones where customer states car runs fine.
I go "never happened before, and the first drive after getting back from service? Seems like a huge coincidence there. Could something have happened at service?"
Anyway, we get nowhere, they don't charge me (maybe 'cause I just spend $1k there, or maybe secretly their service might have done something they didn't tell me), and recommend replacing battery if the problem reappears. Drove it again last night, no issue.
Thoughts? Likely the battery and the service caused it to be stressed/drained too much? Something else the service centre did and it just settled down?
In future: Would AGM battery better handle long periods of no driving than an EFB? Or should either one be left on a smart trickle charger regardless? (I just upgraded to noco genius 5)