Firstfives.org

That's it, red probe on positive post, black on negative, the volts DC read zero or jump all over with scraping the probe tips on the posts. Connect the cables, the car starts and runs fine.

New battery in May, new battery in the VU meter. Test battery in second 528i, 12.8 volts steady on the VU meter.

The car will sit in the garage until spring, battery disconnected. Check the charge every few weeks to prevent low and freezing.

Which will be interesting if the (clean) posts are not cooperating.

my 25 year old radio shack multimeter crapped out after the batteries disintegrated. I feel lost without it.

Must've been cosmically related to digital computer problems. You know, where something goes wacky, you try things until you want to throw it out the window, better go do something else.

Only to come back to see it fixed itself. Thank you, I wasn't making it up.