Black Cat
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 06:40 PM |
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Battery Charger.
Hi all,
I've a Varley Red Top battery and I'm looking for a suitable battery charger.
It needs to be suitable for gel batteries.
The problem is they are all quite expensive compared to normal chargers.
The one I'm currently looking at is an 8A Three Stage Mains Charger which has a trickle feed and is supplied by Varley and they retail at about
£70,00.
My question is is there a cheaper alternative on the market?
Many thanks for your help.
Steve
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stevebubs
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 07:01 PM |
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I use an Optimate III, my mate an Accumate (same company, similar device) on our Odysseys...
http://www.accumate.co.uk/it010001.htm
[Edited on 29/12/08 by stevebubs]
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907
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 08:14 PM |
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Hi,
I have a Halfords Fully Automatic battery charger.
It has switches for sealed or non sealed batteries, and for car or bike.
With it set on sealed/bike I charge my 12v 7a/h gel battery that I have in a model aircraft flight box.
(These are the same as the batteries used in alarm systems.)
The charger detects when the battery is fully charged and switches to a tiny maintenance charge.
Almost fit and forget.
£37.99
HTH
Paul G
Edit. Re. "Fit and forget"
I don't leave this charger on permanently.
It's more a case of not having to watch for when the charge finishes.
e.g. Plug in last thing Saturday night. When I go in the garage Sunday morning, job done.
IMHO, if a battery runs flat in a month or so there's something wrong with it, or the vehicle it's fitted to.
Immobilizers are of course the exception.
[Edited on 30/12/08 by 907]
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nitram38
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 08:57 PM |
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It is the "maintenance charge" that will destroy your battery.
Invest in a ctek charger.
It senses when your battery is charged and stops charging until it reaches 95% full and then tops up again.
This will ensure that your battery lasts longer than when on permenant trickle charging.
Another benefit of the ctek range is that they can recover batteries with very little voltage left.
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MikeRJ
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 09:08 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by nitram38
It is the "maintenance charge" that will destroy your battery.
These batteries can be maintained with a float charge indefinitely. Odyssey supply much better documentation to show this, but Varley even sell a low
current charger specially for trickle charging during vehicle storage etc.
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nitram38
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 09:12 PM |
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And if it is varley charger, it will probably work the way I said the ctek does but at double the price.
Trust me on the constant charge issue. I work with UPS batteries, gel batteries and lead acid.
They do not like being held at full charge. They need to be partially discharged at regular intervals if you want them to last.
[Edited on 29/12/2008 by nitram38]
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UncleFista
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 10:57 PM |
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ALDI are/were doing a charger identical to this one bar the name
and the ALDI one is 6v/12v.
The offer started on Sunday, so they should have some left.
£13 and gets rave reviews, it's intelligent, has a "float" charge mode and "pulse" charges smaller capacity
batteries.
I've not got one myself, but it seems a very popular offer whenever it comes round...
[Edited on 29/12/08 by UncleFista]
Tony Bond / UncleFista
Love is like a snowmobile, speeding across the frozen tundra.
Which suddenly flips, pinning you underneath.
At night the ice-weasels come...
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MikeRJ
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| posted on 29/12/08 at 11:49 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by nitram38
And if it is varley charger, it will probably work the way I said the ctek does but at double the price.
No, it's just a low current, constant voltage charger, nothing
special.
Gel acid batteries certainly die prematurely when trickle charged with the crude chargers found in e.g. burglar alarms. I've replaced several of
these due to dried out electrolyte, but they can be trickle charged indefinitely with the correct type of float charger. The really important aspect
of these batteries is the float charge voltage, which needs to be fairly tightly controlled (and should be temperature compensated ideally).
From the Odyssey Technical Manual.
quote:
An example of the first type of automatic charger is one
that charges a battery up to 14.7V, then immediately
shuts off. An example of the second type of automatic
charger would bring the battery up to 14.7V, then
switches to a float (trickle) voltage of 13.6V; it will stay at
that level indefinitely. The second type of automatic
charger is preferred, because the first type of charger
will undercharge the battery.
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Black Cat
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| posted on 30/12/08 at 10:50 AM |
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Many thanks for your thoughts and advise, I've checked out all the options and am of the opinion that the Optimate 4 satisfies my requirements
in that it will do the job and is within the price range that I had in mind.
I have found it at Would of Power at £39.14 incl VAT and del.
If there are any of you out there, that think otherwise, let me know as I will be ordering one this afternoon if I don't get any negative
reports.
Many thanks for your help.
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britishtrident
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| posted on 30/12/08 at 11:43 AM |
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Lidl or Aldi are much cheaper and the chargers are hi-tech electronicly controlled very good quality.
I have both the Lidl models excellent stuff.
[I] “ What use our work, Bennet, if we cannot care for those we love? .”
― From BBC TV/Amazon's Ripper Street.
[/I]
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