[donut]

It can, but IMO, this is a stopgap measure. (father did it in the '70's when money was tight) Battery may be going south (like you mentioned), you may have a slow electrical drain, bad connections... My vehicles were always parked outside, in sub-zero temps. If they failed to crank, something was wrong. It was actually easier for me to jump it or hook up a booster charger if it started cranking slow and I didn't have time or patience to find out why.