Question:
rv solar panel battery charger :and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of :dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use :distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the :flat surface below the fill tube for each cell.rv solar panel battery charger I think it is mostly :the water that evaporates and less so the acid.
:Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the :proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. Far as I know, there’s no way to put water in this battery. I could be wrong. It doesn’t have the caps on top.
Not even very big flat ones, just two of them? When they first came out with maintenance-free batteries there was no way to add water, but the next big group had thes low visibility caps. Maybe that’s because they weren’t truly maintenance free, but at the time, I thought it was because the maintenance free idea wasn’t quite as good as it sounded. After all, there still has to be an air vent, a gas vent, somewhere, and if you overcharge a maintenance-free battery, won’t it still lose water? I’m guessing that was true and the test conditions for the first batch of them just weren’t as tough as real life conditions with guys like me who take months to start worrying about car problems. Or I might be quite wrong. : : :I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would :give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve :been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace :them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to :remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that :cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But :as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still :working. The washers prevent acid leaking out?
No, they have chemicals in them that neutralize whatever leaks out. I think different parts of the leakage are attracted to, or different reactions take place, at the two posts, so the red washer is for the + and the green is for the -. (Of course they could be the same, anb they’re just soaked in baking soda, and they’re trying to impress us by having two colors, but my guess is they are really different. (Baking Soda is Bicarbonate of Soda, NaHC03, but that doesn’t tell me, knowing as little as I do, if you can mix it with water, soak the felt washers in it, and let it dry out and still have baking soda in the felt. I don’t know. And I still think the red and green are different. rv solar panel battery charger If you don’t have a lab and can’t afford to send them to one, you could tell if they’re different by putting each of them in your mouth. But I don’t have the nerve to do that either. :: :They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t :even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder :to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, 
r that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more :scared of stangers. That 3 in 1 is a monster and heavy. A little hard for me to imagine someone carrying it in their vehicle. I decided it wasn’t something I wanted although I could use it. You can’t get everything you COULD use…
That’s true, especially with a LeBaron trunk. I’m sure it’s intended for carrying in the car. I think some ad mentioned that. There were no pictures of that on the label? For home you are better off with a 6 or 8 amp** charger, which will last forever. The battery in the thing you’re talking about will die eventually and I bet a replacement will little sold and therefor expensive. I say 8 amps because I’m assuming one who buys the monster is in a hurry. I guess it does have the advantage that it can, I gather, start the car without charging the battery, but the alternator will do that afterwards at a pretty high rate. I know what it is. I would always be afraid the battery in the thing had failed, and I didn’t know it. With the charger, I figure it will last until I’m 150.rv solar panel battery charger I was listening to Click and Clack a few weeks ago and they pointed out that a lot of people nowadays are afraid to give people a jump because it’s said to pose a threat to their car’s computers, which didn’t used to be an issue before the days of computers in cars. My computer is of
I heard that show too, but they never really said if the fear was warranted, did they? I was waiting for them to say. It poses a threat I suppose if you connect them backwards, as it did/does to the diodes in the alternator. I’ve gotten or given 100 or 200 jumps in the last 35 years, and I’ve only connected it backwards twice, once about 20 years ago. It didn’t hurt my car, which was the weak one, and I checked and my friend’s car had no problems either. Then once about 6 weeks ago in the ‘88 with the computer, I connected the charger backwards, watched it give sparks several times. Didn’t seem to hurt the running of the car. very little use and only works partially. It just does things like keeping track of miles/hour, trip length, junk like that. It doesn’t do any of those crucial things like gas mixtures, etc. My car actually has a carburetor, one of those finicky Mikuni’s. Now the fuel injected cars whose fuel injectors are regulated by the car’s computer may be suseptible to damage if they give a jump to another car. Of course, they could disconnect their battery, but that’s a hassle. Around here (Berkeley, CA, and environs) it’s gotten pretty hard to get a ride, hitchhiking. That’s been my experience, but I haven’t tried in
That’s depressing. They’re supposed to specialize in pinko commie stuff like that. I still pick up hitchhikers when I see them, but not if there is a busline on the street they’re standing on. Mostly intercity and I only go out of town so often. My last trip to Youngstown Ohio last August, I picked up one for about half the trip. He helped me push the car when I was so low on tran fluid that it wouldn’t go into gear. (I forgot to buy more. Eventually I dug through the trunk and found another quart.) When it was time to drop him off, I had to run around this small town looking for a place that sold beer, because he couldn’t sleep without it, and then I took him to the back of a walmart where he could sleep. He was very nice. Normally, whether I’m hitching or picking people up, I never tell them where I’m going or how far. That way I can get out or put them out gracefully, by telling them our paths are diverging, and not antagonizing anybody. Although if they really are up to no good, it probably doesn’t matter if one antagaonizes them or not. quite a few years. I used to hitch with my bike over a bridge and usually had to wait a 1/2 hour or so. rv solar panel battery charger
Not too good. I once hitched with a bike, in fact the date is easy to recall because the week ended in New York with the bicentennial fireworks, July 1976. I thought it would be impossible, or I’d only get picked up by people with pick up trucks. I got about 5 rides, all I needed and none had pickup trucks, just cars. One was a girl who said she had never picked up a hh before, but my bike made me seem trustworthy. Indeed the bike still worked, but the temps were about 99 and my roommate had said we would ride in the morning and evening and sightsee in the middle of the day. We never did any sightseeing so I left him and his cousin and I hitched from the coast of VA. to the first train station on which I could put the bike. I think that was Richmond but the last girl drove me all the way to dc. I guess I better do something about my discharged battery. It isn’t good to leave it discharged, I gather.
I’m not convinced. I don’t see why once it is down, it matters how long it stays that way. I don’t think it is like a suit stuffed in a corner where the wrinkles set in. I’m not even sure suits get worse after the first humid day. But I’m guessing and you should still fix it. Maybe I’ll give it the 2 amp charge today. rv solar panel battery charger
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rv solar panel battery charger Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out :there : on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t : overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the : cigarette lighter socket. : : : :Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage I don’t park either car in the garage, but they don’t get tons of sun either. $100 seems like a lot for a charger, and I don’t remember encountering a solar car battery charger. Solar is attractive to me, and
Whitney has one for 30 dollars 1 1/2 watts, that looks like mine, although I would like to think I paid less or got more. It’s probably enough for you. It would at least extend your one month time to 2 or 3 months. Try to set the surface of the panel perpendicaular to the sun’s rays, so you’ll get more rays.rv solar panel battery charger Also one for 77 that is 5 watts. Also a multivoltage one for charging cellphones and small batteries and car batteries for 35, and on another page 15 watts for 152 up to 45 watts for $486 (big one includes 3 15 watt plus a required controller) The first one says “will not charge a dead battery” but i”ve always wondered if that is true, say,if you gave it a month, why wouldn’t it? I think they are afraid people will complain if it takes a month. 
They also have three jump starters, one with the brand name Jump-N-Carry and another whch says “Carry your own emergency power supply anywhere you go.” I’ve got a mind to look into solar panels for my roof, partly because my roof is conveniently configured for an array of panels.
rv solar panel battery charger
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Are you sure this battery is not near enough dead? If it’s been left in a near-discharged state for a while, the plates probably have a good sulfate coating by now. Whether that causes the charge rate to drop so quickly I don’t know for sure, but I guess the sulfate coating causes an increased internal resistance. -=- Alan – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones. rv solar panel battery charger
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – :To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient rv solar panel battery charger :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones.
Dan, I question whether the charge indicator on your trickle charger is a reliable indication of full charge. The best measure is to check the specific gravity of the battery acid, if that is possible. If the battery is sealed but has an “indicator eye” that shows a full charge then that is satisfactory. But neither of these indicators tells whether the battery is any good. For that you need to do a proper battery load test. By proper load test I mean a type recommended by the car or battery manufacturer. When I was a GM dealer mechanic years ago, this was a sore point with GM for warranty claims. The proper procedure called for first charging the battery until the “eye” showed green and then conducting a load test as follows: Draw 300 amps for 15 seconds. Let battery rest for one minute. Draw battery’s specified load test current (printed on Delco batteries) and record voltage after 15 seconds while load is still applied. As I recall, a good battery had to maintain at least 9.6 volts at temperatures of about 70 degrees or above. If the battery couldn’t be charged to produce a green eye, it was bad and shouldn’t be further tested. Back then, many mechanics had a battery testers that only drew 75 amps. These were not adequate to do a proper test. Around here in Northern Virginia, many auto parts stores will test a battery for free. I don’t know how good the test equipment is that such stores use. Also, in my experience a severely discharged battery may need *hours* on charge to fully recover; even on a shop charger. It is my opinion that the you give a marginal battery the best chance to rejuvenate by slow charging for all day or more. When charging a car battery, you are attempting to reverse a chemical process. When dealing with an old battery or one that has sat in a discharged state, the chemicals may resist this reversal process. Bottom line, if you have doubts about the condition of the battery, leave it on the trickle charger for a couple of days and then have it load tested. It is also a good idea to test the charging system output any time you are diagnosing battery problems. However, testing voltage is not enough. A good way to test alternator output is to use a clamp on ammeter at the battery while putting a load on the system with a battery tester. Hope this helps, Ed P — TO REPLY, remove “ersatz” from domain name in the “From” line above. This address alteration is to avoid spam.
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:To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones. Dan
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I’ve got 8 cars/trucks and 5 trickle chargers. I’m happy. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
– George H. McDowell Wichita, Kansas http://www.carnut.com/ http://www.georgemcdowell.com/
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: something I hadn’t considered. But :there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that :signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the :battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I :guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 :years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration. : :We don’t know that it is deteriorated. I’ll admit that I think any :discharging of the battery is bad for it (of course to avoid that you :could never use it) and any full discharge is definitely bad. But :I’ve had more than one of them down to dead at least 20 times and :still used it for a year or two afterwards. : :BTW, they use hydrometers to directly measure at least some :characteristic of the battery. As things get more reliable, it seems :like a waste of money to buy a moderately good one ($10? just :guessing), but those little ones with 5 colored balls are hard to find :and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of :dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use :distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the :flat surface below the fill tube for each cell. I think it is mostly :the water that evaporates and less so the acid. ) : :Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the :proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. Far as I know, there’s no way to put water in this battery. I could be wrong. It doesn’t have the caps on top. : :: Pour some baking soda ::on it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you ::don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty ::with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge ::it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then ::wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the ::baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get ::the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red ::felt washers until after I did this. : :Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the :clamps? : :There probably are none. Few places put them on for you. (I don’t go :to many shops and I have the least amount of work done that I can get :away with. I think someplace in NY or Chicago offered them once and I :took them. But my sample in the last 19 years in Baltimore is pretty :small. It includes 3 gas stations, pep boys, K-mart, Firestone, 2 ther shops, Jiffy Lube, three other tire places, three muffler :places, two convertible top places, one body shop, two transmission :shops, and I think that is it. Plainly, a lot of these places don’t :service batteries at all. And I think only pep boys ever replaced a :battery for me. Other times I just buy it and put it in myself because :I don’t want to wait in line. : :I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would :give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve :been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace :them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to :remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that :cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But :as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still :working. The washers prevent acid leaking out? :: :: ::My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different :: ::What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) : :What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers : :I get it now. It’s so obvious I don’t know how I missed it. : :for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I :drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing :their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically :to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you :get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of :my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a :charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in :and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s : :They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t :even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder :to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, r that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more :scared of stangers. That 3 in 1 is a monster and heavy. A little hard for me to imagine someone carrying it in their vehicle. I decided it wasn’t something I wanted although I could use it. You can’t get everything you COULD use… I was listening to Click and Clack a few weeks ago and they pointed out that a lot of people nowadays are afraid to give people a jump because it’s said to pose a threat to their car’s computers, which didn’t used to be an issue before the days of computers in cars. My computer is of very little use and only works partially. It just does things like keeping track of miles/hour, trip length, junk like that. It doesn’t do any of those crucial things like gas mixtures, etc. My car actually has a carburetor, one of those finicky Mikuni’s. Now the fuel injected cars whose fuel injectors are regulated by the car’s computer may be suseptible to damage if they give a jump to another car. Of course, they could disconnect their battery, but that’s a hassle. :What I really like is when a young pretty woman :gives me a jump. It’s happened a couple times. I really admire them, :compared to all the other females. It does seem a little harder to :get one now, but it’s hard to judge. The more crowded some place is, :the harder it is to get aride when hitchhiking, and I’m a little tired f this and probably more impatient when waiting. I hadn’t needed ne for more than 7 years until the last month before I bought the new :car. If I had bought it when I should have, I wouldn’t have had to :ask. I don’t mind asking. I like meeting friendly people. But I was :annoyed that I let my car fall apart. Anyhow, I don’t think it took :more than 5 minutes one time and no more than 10 minutes the other :time. Plus I had to hail a friend before he drove away in the middle f the night to do it on a third occasion that month. Around here (Berkeley, CA, and environs) it’s gotten pretty hard to get a ride, hitchhiking. That’s been my experience, but I haven’t tried in quite a few years. I used to hitch with my bike over a bridge and usually had to wait a 1/2 hour or so. I guess I better do something about my discharged battery. It isn’t good to leave it discharged, I gather. Maybe I’ll give it the 2 amp charge today. : :I’m not going to reinstall my battery buddy until I start having :trouble of one sort or another. : :also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there 
Costco) already. :: ::chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and :: :: :: : :remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
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A trolling motor is a small outboard motor. It’s great to use when you are fishing.
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Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket.
Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage — Rickety
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: Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out :there : on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t : overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the : cigarette lighter socket. : : : :Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage I don’t park either car in the garage, but they don’t get tons of sun either. $100 seems like a lot for a charger, and I don’t remember encountering a solar car battery charger. Solar is attractive to me, and I’ve got a mind to look into solar panels for my roof, partly because my roof is conveniently configured for an array of panels.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – : : : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you :sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, :unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. I’ve been leaving it disconnected for something like 8 months. Probably drove it 5 or 6 times during this time, each time around 20 miles, mostly on the freeway and then disconnected the battery by removing the clamp from one of the battery posts. So, I guess that would suggest that either there’s a drain even while disconnected or the alternator’s not supplying enough charging current,
Right. Another story. I was in NY and I had reason to believe my charging current wasn’t adequate, but as usual I did nothing (although when I put on a new belt or have one put on, I always save the old one in the trunk, in case the new one ever fails.). I didn’t look at it but I drove from NYC to Chicago, and then to Indianapolis, Columbus Ohio and in the middle of the night, I was hooking up with the Pa. Turnpike near Pittsburgh. The lights had been dim, so I stopped in a big service plaza just before gettin on the turnpike. The car wouldn’t start, and the fan belt was litterally hanging on by a thread. It had worn all the way through except for one strong strand the thickness of button hole thread. I was about 30 feet from the service bay. I don’t remember if we pushed it in, or he jumped me and I drove in, or I just took the belt out of the trunk and installed it where I stood. I started the car maybe 40 or 50 times on that 6 or 7 day trip, and they took a little longer then than now (big v8’s) so I must have been charging it some all that time, but I’m pretty sure it was undercharged even at the start of the trip. something I hadn’t considered. But there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration.
We don’t know that it is deteriorated. I’ll admit that I think any discharging of the battery is bad for it (of course to avoid that you could never use it) and any full discharge is definitely bad. But I’ve had more than one of them down to dead at least 20 times and still used it for a year or two afterwards. BTW, they use hydrometers to directly measure at least some characteristic of the battery. As things get more reliable, it seems like a waste of money to buy a moderately good one ($10? just guessing), but those little ones with 5 colored balls are hard to find and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the flat surface below the fill tube for each cell. I think it is mostly the water that evaporates and less so the acid. ) Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. : Pour some baking soda n it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you :don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty :with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge :it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then :wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the :baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get :the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red :felt washers until after I did this. Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the clamps?
There probably are none. Few places put them on for you. (I don’t go to many shops and I have the least amount of work done that I can get away with. I think someplace in NY or Chicago offered them once and I took them. But my sample in the last 19 years in Baltimore is pretty small. It includes 3 gas stations, pep boys, K-mart, Firestone, 2 other shops, Jiffy Lube, three other tire places, three muffler places, two convertible top places, one body shop, two transmission shops, and I think that is it. Plainly, a lot of these places don’t service batteries at all. And I think only pep boys ever replaced a battery for me. Other times I just buy it and put it in myself because I don’t want to wait in line. I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still working. : : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different : :What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers
I get it now. It’s so obvious I don’t know how I missed it. for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s
They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, or that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more scared of stangers. What I really like is when a young pretty woman gives me a jump. It’s happened a couple times. I really admire them, compared to all the other females. It does seem a little harder to get one now, but it’s hard to judge. The more crowded some place is, the harder it is to get aride when hitchhiking, and I’m a little tired of this and probably more impatient when waiting. I hadn’t needed one for more than 7 years until the last month before I bought the new car. If I had bought it when I should have, I wouldn’t have had to ask. I don’t mind asking. I like meeting friendly people. But I was annoyed that I let my car fall apart. Anyhow, I don’t think it took more than 5 minutes one time and no more than 10 minutes the other time. Plus I had to hail a friend before he drove away in the middle of the night to do it on a third occasion that month. I’m not going to reinstall my battery buddy until I start having trouble of one sort or another. also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there (Costco) already. : :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : : :
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Response:
: snip) : : Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is : how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if : that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, : assuming that the clock is the only drain. : : : :It is not just the clock. In modern cars, there is parasitic draw of a 100 mA r more with everything turned “OFF”. This current supplies “memory” functions :for computers, radio, clock, alarm systems, etc. Depending on a variety of :factors, a battery draining down to the point where it won’t start a car in a :about a month is not unusual. : : : : I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get : at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy : with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the : question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist : it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of : cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible : that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. : My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing : that. : : :To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : Really good idea. I have a couple of multimeters and can do this test. One analogue, the other digital. I think either will work. What concerns me is that the battery went dead even disconnected. I figure there’s either a drain across the top between the terminals or maybe my alternator isn’t supplying a decent charge while driving 20 miles every 5 or 6 weeks. snip) : : : The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a : trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I : don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it : shuts off when the battery’s full. : : :What keeps a battery from freezing is its state of charge; that is the acid :concentration in a fully charged battery freezes at a much lower temperature :than in a discharged battery. It’s not a concern where I am. It rarely freezes and when it does, it’s usually a light freeze. : : snip) : : : It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will : damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and : get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully : charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally. : : :Excessive charging causes the electrolyte to bubble and water to “boil” off. If :acid level isn’t monitored and water added as necessary, the battery can be :damaged. High-current-rate over charging can overheat a battery and damage it. My battery is “Maintenance Free” and I don’t think there’s any way to add water, but I could be wrong. There’s nothing like those caps or a cap strip that fits on the top like the batteries you can add water to. Maybe I should use the 2 amp setting rather than the 6 amp setting when charging this battery, if that will minimize overheating or the tendency to deposit sulphate on the lead plates, as Meirman has suggested can happen when charging at too high a current. It may not be an issue with this charger, since its maximum is 6 amps. I was reading a car battery FAQ and it said you can charge at up to 1% of the CCA, which for mine is 875. 1% of that would be almost 9 amps. However, if it’s better to charge it slower and I’m not in a hurry, I can use the 2 amp setting. The instructions that came with it didn’t suggest this in any way, however. The make it seem like you’d only use the 2 amp setting for small batteries – “Motorcycles, Snowmobiles, lawnmowers, or maintain charge in audo, truck, RV’s.” Actually, here’s their chart to guide you in selecting the charge rate: Charge Rate Charge time: Recommended Hours Uses 2 AMP 3-8 Motorcycles, 12 v only Snowmobiles, lawnmowers, or maintain charge in auto, truck, RV’s 6 AMP 6-8 Trolling motors, 6 or 12v recreational vehicles automobiles, trucks, vans Why they would have 6-8 hours for 6 amps and 3-8 hours for 2 amps kind of escapes me unless it was a typo or unless they thought you’d only use 2 amps for small batteries in the first place. And what’s a “trolling motor”? This chart would almost suggest that I can charge it at 2 amps and not worry about overcharging it, but it doesn’t say that. If you can “maintain charge in auto” doesn’t that mean you can’t overcharge at that rate? : : : :Ed P
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…He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe
he can become president… Hey – watch it! 8^) …What do you mean, Your costco was out…
I didn’t know that’s what they were calling it these days, but isn’t that what Bill Clinton got in trouble for? 8^) — Bill Putney (to reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the first letter of the alphabet)
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: : : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you :sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, :unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. I’ve been leaving it disconnected for something like 8 months. Probably drove it 5 or 6 times during this time, each time around 20 miles, mostly on the freeway and then disconnected the battery by removing the clamp from one of the battery posts. So, I guess that would suggest that either there’s a drain even while disconnected or the alternator’s not supplying enough charging current, something I hadn’t considered. But there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration. : Pour some baking soda n it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you :don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty :with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge :it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then :wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the :baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get :the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red :felt washers until after I did this. Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the clamps? : :My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. : :I think he meant, since it discharged deeply, but slowly, it should be :recharged slowly. I don’t think he was talking about a trolling :battery. He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe :he can become president. : :Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have :another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much :more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I :get? : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different : :What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there (Costco) already. : :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : : : :remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
Response:
-Posted and emailed- Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock,
I’m sure that is enough if you can get the car started. Ed’s convinced me that a month is enough (and everything else he said.) assuming that the clock is the only drain. : :You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when :the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy
Or Ed suggested measuring the whole car load. with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that.
After I disconnected it when I was away for 4 days one Thanksgiving, and it started fine when I got back, I started doing that, and I did it for months. It was fine. In fact, total, I think I’ve done it for years. Off course I had the red and green washers. I looked into buying a switch, and at that size, there at least 20 dollars. Didn’t seem worth it. You should get the solar panel. Then, you’ll be done. Another thing you could do is buy a Battery Buddy. IIRC they were 40$ at JCWhitney but I paid 45 or 50 locally. When the voltage gets low enough, it disconnects the battery, and you have to push the big red button to start the car again. When you don’t need it for this car you can transfer it to another car. It goes between the + cable and the post, with one wire to ground. Whitney doesn’t have it anymore but they have something similar. But I know that Battery Buddy has worked maybe 100 times for me, and it still works well. Except for the last two months, I was always able to start the car just by pushing the red button. Ed reminds me of various memories. OF course the radio will forget the time and the stations. It also said that the computer will forget the best settings for the spark etc., but in terms of performance, I’ve never noticed a difference, in the 88 2.5L. It was only the radio that I had to reset. Back to the quality of the connection, corrosion, invisible to the eye, can get inside the battery terminal, or on the battaery post. You need a battery post brush, which will have two brushes, one for each task. AFAIC you can buy the cheapest one they have. You only have to use it about once a year, and/or when you suspect a problem, and it will last years. I used to be reckless and now I’ve been lethargic, so all my repair stories have a point where they reach a crisis. My car had been stalling or hard to start for 3 or 4 days, and a friend came from NYC for one night and had to catch the train to DC in the morning to be at a meeting, the reason for his trip, and he had to be on time. And on the way to the train my car stopped again and wouldn’t start. This time I touched the battery post for some reason and one was hot and the other cold. The cold one sounds like the bad one and the hot one full of energy. But it’s the other way around. The hot one had a bad connection and generated heat as the current was forced through. While my friend waited I had to take off the cable, which might even have been tightened on, dig out the brush from the trunk, and clean the post and the cable connection with the brush. But all this took only 3 minutes and the car worked for months after that. :and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the :extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once :evert 2 weeks or less. The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I
And like Ed says, a charged battery won’t freeze except at a much lower temperature than plain water freezing. Even a discharged battery has some things in solution and won’t freeze at 32 iirc. don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full. : :I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the :circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little :neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 :seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that :way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped :maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it :still works fine 35 years later. Why’d you set it to 12v?
I’m sure because it didn’t work at 6. I didn’t have a meter then, so I didn’t spend much time thinking. I had a housemate who tried to sell me his trickle charger for $2 when he moved, but I refused. Now I’m sorry I didn’t buy it from him! : :A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes :about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take :the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps :lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead :plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the
I misspelled spongy and couldn’t find any hits in Yahoo. No E. The correct spelling looks like it rhymes with Wong Lee. If the 1 amp charger will do the least damage I should get that one instead. I couldn’t figure that out reading the boxes. One reason the 1 amp wasn’t attractive to me is that it doesn’t have pincer clips. It has connectors with round holes you are supposed to put around the terminals
Mine has clips. You could cut off the holes and put on clips although even at RS, they might be 2 dollars a pair for big enough to go over a battery clamp. on the battery. The idea with the 1 amp I saw at Kragen (Shumacher, I think) is that you mount it under the hood and just plug it in when the car’s idle, presumably in your garage. This would be sort of OK for me except that I have two cars and might want to charge the other battery sometimes. Also, come to think of it, I’m not so sure how good a contact you would get with just those thin pieces of metal with a 1/2 inch hole
Thin is probably ok. in them. Maybe I should just spring for one of the $60 models that is “automatic.” : :that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a :car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). Someone once told me that trickle charging won’t harm your batteries if you just leave them charging after they’re charged, but one of these boxes said that even a trickle charger will screw up your car battery if you let it keep charging, so I’m concerned. My impression is that for an “ordinary” car battery 1 – 2 amp is considered “trickle charging.”
definitely :Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first :place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the :dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and :green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They
:definitely stop the deposit formation. I forgot to mention that there is definitely some corrosion at both terminals. A lot more at one terminal than the other. I know I should clean off that corrosion, but I don’t know how. I guess I could take off the connection cables, and clean the connections off with a wire brush and some slowly running water. Or maybe I should pour some baking soda on too to neutralize any acid.
Do that first. I don’t use running water after the wire brush. If I do anything I blow the dust away, whle being certain to close my eyes first. I don’t know what I *should* do. ? I assume there’s sulphuric acid causing the corrosion (?). Other than the corrosion, I see no evidence of current passing over the battery top.
But that’s plenty, assuming I understood you that the battery discharges when it is disconnected at one post. But maybe corrosion is evidence of passing current, I don’t know.
I’m not saying that, not all the time, but your battery goes dead. Of course at the top we decided the car itself could do that. So you should clean it but don’t assume that will fix it. There’s an “eye” that you’re supposed to use to see if it’s charged, “green” or “dark”, but I’m colorblind (total green blind), so that’s no use to me! : : :I’ve never had any experience with a :car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. :Thanks. : 
an : :
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(snip) Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, assuming that the clock is the only drain.
It is not just the clock. In modern cars, there is parasitic draw of a 100 mA or more with everything turned “OFF”. This current supplies “memory” functions for computers, radio, clock, alarm systems, etc. Depending on a variety of factors, a battery draining down to the point where it won’t start a car in a about a month is not unusual. I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that.
To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. (snip) The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full.
What keeps a battery from freezing is its state of charge; that is the acid concentration in a fully charged battery freezes at a much lower temperature than in a discharged battery. (snip) It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally.
Excessive charging causes the electrolyte to bubble and water to “boil” off. If acid level isn’t monitored and water added as necessary, the battery can be damaged. High-current-rate over charging can overheat a battery and damage it. Ed P — TO REPLY, remove “ersatz” from domain name in the “From” line above. This address alteration is to avoid spam.
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I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start.
I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. Pour some baking soda on it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red felt washers until after I did this. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery.
I think he meant, since it discharged deeply, but slowly, it should be recharged slowly. I don’t think he was talking about a trolling battery. He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe he can become president. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different
What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and
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More info: Here’s the specs that it says on the battery: Sears DieHard Gold Maintenance Free M36090 Group 34/78 875 GCA 1000 CA Thanks… Dan
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:My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. A somewhat fast charge (10 amp for some hours) is ok, but I dont know what a Kragen Quick Charge(tm?) is.. Your mechinc sounds confused, your car battery should “never” be deep cycled. You are deep cycling it by letting it sit for months, which is the problem. :Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the :automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last :longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a :car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Automatic shut off is pretty important to me. Either the ‘1 amp’ or the larger ones with a 1amp setting are fine. Automatic means you can hook it up and forget about it. With the manual you will need to hook it up once a week for a few hours or overnight maybe, which is fine so long as you can remeber to do it..
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Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket. –Geoff
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I think what your mechanic meant was that you should have the battery “trickle charged” instead of “quick charged.” – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
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I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery.
I am not sure the clock can do this in such a short time, although the more I type the more I think it might be possible. Call a long-term storage garage and ask them how long cars can go without starting and still start. Or a weekly garage and maybe they’ll know too. I don’t think there was any difference in 1983, but you might mention the year of your car. If it really is the clock, you could remove the fuse or put a switch in the wire. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a battery charger. Everyone should have one of those. You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. Or you could ask someone who knows more than I do. I just bought a new clock radio that says it will run with no display 8 hours on a new 9 volt alkaline battery. (I wouldn’t buy this if it didn’t have special features I want.) That seems awfully little, considering my watch will run 5 years on a much smaller battery. And the imitation Bose radio I had ran about 15 months or more on one 12 volt battery, while always displaying the correct time. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and
In 1967, when my cousin gave me his 1950 Olds V-8 300 CID, he also gave me his 1-amp charger. The 6-volt system had some trouble starting the car in the Chicago winter, and I eventually ran a long extension cord from the fraternity’s pantry to a sign and then to the car. I didn’t get the idea it was designed to mount under the hood, but I slid it in there anyhow, with the cord coming out of the grill, and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once evert 2 weeks or less. I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it still works fine 35 years later. As the battery voltage rises, that opposing voltage automatically slows the speed of charging I think. When there is no longer any lead in solution, I think that decreases the (reverse) current tremendously. So with a 1-amp charger, I didn’t really think it was necessary to turn off the charger at any time. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ve always wondered if they really have parts to turn off the charging, or if it just stops because the battery voltage prevents further charging. Anyone know? A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. (or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the sulphate too is lost to the battery until the next time the battery is largely discharged, it seems to me you might get it back. (When the battery is new or charged, you have lead plates and the plates of the opposite pole sitting in sulphuric acid and water. To make the electricity, iirc, the sulphuric acid dissolves the lead, leaving lead ions and sulphate radicals dissolved in the liquid. This is reversed when you recharge the battery, and iirc the faster one goes the more the lead and sulphate can combine with each other and get buried under plain lead. I’m forgetting something however, partly because I can’t recall the other half of the reaction.) Often I start my car with a boost from someone else, and I use the alternator to finish charging it. I used to have a built in ammeter and the alternator charged a lot faster than 1 amp, and it would have to be, because with good cables, one can start the car without recharging the battery at all. Yet after one drives a half hour, the battery will seem pretty powerful. So sometimes to slow the charging, I turned on the heater fan and maybe the headlights too. But with only a voltmeter and not an ammeter, it’s hard to know when I go from charging at 4 amps to 1 amp or zero. And I was never sure if I was slowing down the charging too much (I wanted it fully charged when I arrived but no sooner) and I don’t much give a darn anymore, so I don’t do that. that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it.
Sounds fair to me. Does it say what happens if you continue to charge after it is fully charged? It still passes current at a 50% rate, even when fully charged? Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged.
I think that is mostly because charging it too fast damages it. I’m not sure if charging very slow, 1 amp, does any damage or not. Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They definitely stop the deposit formation. Maybe something else is draining the battery. My last burglar alarm seemed to drain the battery. Eventually I stopped using it when I was at home. I only used it for short periods when I went somewhere, esp. if I had the top down. Pat Goss says if there is enough current to light a +57 bulb between a battery post and a battery cable, when the car is off, that is too much. I connected it there with long wires so I could take the light with me under the dash while I removed and replaced fuses. I forget how many milliamps it was, but the burglar alarm doubled how much the car was using. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
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: :I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car :rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a :month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, :mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery :cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. : :I am not sure the clock can do this in such a short time, although the :more I type the more I think it might be possible. Call a long-term :storage garage and ask them how long cars can go without starting and :still start. Or a weekly garage and maybe they’ll know too. I don’t :think there was any difference in 1983, but you might mention the year f your car. If it really is the clock, you could remove the fuse or :put a switch in the wire. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a :battery charger. Everyone should have one of those. Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, assuming that the clock is the only drain. : :You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when :the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. Or you :could ask someone who knows more than I do. I just bought a new clock :radio that says it will run with no display 8 hours on a new 9 volt :alkaline battery. (I wouldn’t buy this if it didn’t have special :features I want.) I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that. : :That seems awfully little, considering my watch will run 5 years on a :much smaller battery. And the imitation Bose radio I had ran about 15 :months or more on one 12 volt battery, while always displaying the :correct time. : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. : :Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have :another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much :more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I :get? : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : :In 1967, when my cousin gave me his 1950 Olds V-8 300 CID, he also :gave me his 1-amp charger. The 6-volt system had some trouble :starting the car in the Chicago winter, and I eventually ran a long :extension cord from the fraternity’s pantry to a sign and then to the :car. I didn’t get the idea it was designed to mount under the hood, :but I slid it in there anyhow, with the cord coming out of the grill, :and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the :extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once :evert 2 weeks or less. The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full. : :I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the :circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little :neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 :seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that :way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped :maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it :still works fine 35 years later. Why’d you set it to 12v? I had a housemate who tried to sell me his trickle charger for $2 when he moved, but I refused. Now I’m sorry I didn’t buy it from him! : :As the battery voltage rises, that opposing voltage automatically :slows the speed of charging I think. When there is no longer any lead :in solution, I think that decreases the (reverse) current :tremendously. So with a 1-amp charger, I didn’t really think it was :necessary to turn off the charger at any time. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ve :always wondered if they really have parts to turn off the charging, or :if it just stops because the battery voltage prevents further :charging. Anyone know? : :A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes :about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take :the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps :lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead :plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the :sulphate too is lost to the battery until the next time the battery is :largely discharged, it seems to me you might get it back. (When the :battery is new or charged, you have lead plates and the plates of the pposite pole sitting in sulphuric acid and water. To make the :electricity, iirc, the sulphuric acid dissolves the lead, leaving lead :ions and sulphate radicals dissolved in the liquid. This is reversed :when you recharge the battery, and iirc the faster one goes the more :the lead and sulphate can combine with each other and get buried under :plain lead. I’m forgetting something however, partly because I can’t :recall the other half of the reaction.) If the 1 amp charger will do the least damage I should get that one instead. I couldn’t figure that out reading the boxes. One reason the 1 amp wasn’t attractive to me is that it doesn’t have pincer clips. It has connectors with round holes you are supposed to put around the terminals on the battery. The idea with the 1 amp I saw at Kragen (Shumacher, I think) is that you mount it under the hood and just plug it in when the car’s idle, presumably in your garage. This would be sort of OK for me except that I have two cars and might want to charge the other battery sometimes. Also, come to think of it, I’m not so sure how good a contact you would get with just those thin pieces of metal with a 1/2 inch hole in them. Maybe I should just spring for one of the $60 models that is “automatic.” : :Often I start my car with a boost from someone else, and I use the :alternator to finish charging it. I used to have a built in ammeter :and the alternator charged a lot faster than 1 amp, and it would have :to be, because with good cables, one can start the car without :recharging the battery at all. Yet after one drives a half hour, the :battery will seem pretty powerful. So sometimes to slow the :charging, I turned on the heater fan and maybe the headlights too. :But with only a voltmeter and not an ammeter, it’s hard to know when I :go from charging at 4 amps to 1 amp or zero. And I was never sure if :I was slowing down the charging too much (I wanted it fully charged :when I arrived but no sooner) and I don’t much give a darn anymore, so :I don’t do that. : :that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a :car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). : :I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return :it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current :automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say :the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% :when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to :unhook it. : :Sounds fair to me. Does it say what happens if you continue to charge :after it is fully charged? It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally. : :It still passes current at a 50% rate, even when fully charged? Yep. I figure that what’s going on there is that the resistance of the battery doubles. Just a guess. : :Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the :automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last :longer if you keep it well charged. : :I think that is mostly because charging it too fast damages it. I’m :not sure if charging very slow, 1 amp, does any damage or not. Someone once told me that trickle charging won’t harm your batteries if you just leave them charging after they’re charged, but one of these boxes said that even a trickle charger will screw up your car battery if you let it keep charging, so I’m concerned. My impression is that for an “ordinary” car battery 1 – 2 amp is considered “trickle charging.” : :Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first :place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the :dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and :green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They :definitely stop the deposit formation. I forgot to mention that there is definitely … read more »
Response:
Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket.
That’s a great idea. I plum forgot that I used one of those things for a year or so. I was happy with it so I can’t remember why I stopped. Oh yeah, I used it for my mother’s car but never wanted to use it for mine. My mother stopped driving. I bought mine at a hamfest for maybe 30 dollars, maybe 8 years ago. –Geoff
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Response:
I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
Response:
I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
Response:
More info: Here’s the specs that it says on the battery: Sears DieHard Gold Maintenance Free M36090 Group 34/78 875 GCA 1000 CA Thanks… Dan
Response:
:My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. A somewhat fast charge (10 amp for some hours) is ok, but I dont know what a Kragen Quick Charge(tm?) is.. Your mechinc sounds confused, your car battery should “never” be deep cycled. You are deep cycling it by letting it sit for months, which is the problem. :Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the :automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last :longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a :car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Automatic shut off is pretty important to me. Either the ‘1 amp’ or the larger ones with a 1amp setting are fine. Automatic means you can hook it up and forget about it. With the manual you will need to hook it up once a week for a few hours or overnight maybe, which is fine so long as you can remeber to do it..
Response:
Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket. –Geoff
Response:
I think what your mechanic meant was that you should have the battery “trickle charged” instead of “quick charged.” – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
Response:
I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery.
I am not sure the clock can do this in such a short time, although the more I type the more I think it might be possible. Call a long-term storage garage and ask them how long cars can go without starting and still start. Or a weekly garage and maybe they’ll know too. I don’t think there was any difference in 1983, but you might mention the year of your car. If it really is the clock, you could remove the fuse or put a switch in the wire. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a battery charger. Everyone should have one of those. You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. Or you could ask someone who knows more than I do. I just bought a new clock radio that says it will run with no display 8 hours on a new 9 volt alkaline battery. (I wouldn’t buy this if it didn’t have special features I want.) That seems awfully little, considering my watch will run 5 years on a much smaller battery. And the imitation Bose radio I had ran about 15 months or more on one 12 volt battery, while always displaying the correct time. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and
In 1967, when my cousin gave me his 1950 Olds V-8 300 CID, he also gave me his 1-amp charger. The 6-volt system had some trouble starting the car in the Chicago winter, and I eventually ran a long extension cord from the fraternity’s pantry to a sign and then to the car. I didn’t get the idea it was designed to mount under the hood, but I slid it in there anyhow, with the cord coming out of the grill, and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once evert 2 weeks or less. I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it still works fine 35 years later. As the battery voltage rises, that opposing voltage automatically slows the speed of charging I think. When there is no longer any lead in solution, I think that decreases the (reverse) current tremendously. So with a 1-amp charger, I didn’t really think it was necessary to turn off the charger at any time. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ve always wondered if they really have parts to turn off the charging, or if it just stops because the battery voltage prevents further charging. Anyone know? A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. (or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the sulphate too is lost to the battery until the next time the battery is largely discharged, it seems to me you might get it back. (When the battery is new or charged, you have lead plates and the plates of the opposite pole sitting in sulphuric acid and water. To make the electricity, iirc, the sulphuric acid dissolves the lead, leaving lead ions and sulphate radicals dissolved in the liquid. This is reversed when you recharge the battery, and iirc the faster one goes the more the lead and sulphate can combine with each other and get buried under plain lead. I’m forgetting something however, partly because I can’t recall the other half of the reaction.) Often I start my car with a boost from someone else, and I use the alternator to finish charging it. I used to have a built in ammeter and the alternator charged a lot faster than 1 amp, and it would have to be, because with good cables, one can start the car without recharging the battery at all. Yet after one drives a half hour, the battery will seem pretty powerful. So sometimes to slow the charging, I turned on the heater fan and maybe the headlights too. But with only a voltmeter and not an ammeter, it’s hard to know when I go from charging at 4 amps to 1 amp or zero. And I was never sure if I was slowing down the charging too much (I wanted it fully charged when I arrived but no sooner) and I don’t much give a darn anymore, so I don’t do that. that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it.
Sounds fair to me. Does it say what happens if you continue to charge after it is fully charged? It still passes current at a 50% rate, even when fully charged? Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged.
I think that is mostly because charging it too fast damages it. I’m not sure if charging very slow, 1 amp, does any damage or not. Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They definitely stop the deposit formation. Maybe something else is draining the battery. My last burglar alarm seemed to drain the battery. Eventually I stopped using it when I was at home. I only used it for short periods when I went somewhere, esp. if I had the top down. Pat Goss says if there is enough current to light a +57 bulb between a battery post and a battery cable, when the car is off, that is too much. I connected it there with long wires so I could take the light with me under the dash while I removed and replaced fuses. I forget how many milliamps it was, but the burglar alarm doubled how much the car was using. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
Response:
Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket.
That’s a great idea. I plum forgot that I used one of those things for a year or so. I was happy with it so I can’t remember why I stopped. Oh yeah, I used it for my mother’s car but never wanted to use it for mine. My mother stopped driving. I bought mine at a hamfest for maybe 30 dollars, maybe 8 years ago. –Geoff
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-Posted and emailed-
: :I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car :rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a :month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, :mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery :cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. : :I am not sure the clock can do this in such a short time, although the :more I type the more I think it might be possible. Call a long-term :storage garage and ask them how long cars can go without starting and :still start. Or a weekly garage and maybe they’ll know too. I don’t :think there was any difference in 1983, but you might mention the year f your car. If it really is the clock, you could remove the fuse or :put a switch in the wire. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a :battery charger. Everyone should have one of those. Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, assuming that the clock is the only drain. : :You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when :the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. Or you :could ask someone who knows more than I do. I just bought a new clock :radio that says it will run with no display 8 hours on a new 9 volt :alkaline battery. (I wouldn’t buy this if it didn’t have special :features I want.) I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that. : :That seems awfully little, considering my watch will run 5 years on a :much smaller battery. And the imitation Bose radio I had ran about 15 :months or more on one 12 volt battery, while always displaying the :correct time. : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. : :Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have :another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much :more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I :get? : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : :In 1967, when my cousin gave me his 1950 Olds V-8 300 CID, he also :gave me his 1-amp charger. The 6-volt system had some trouble :starting the car in the Chicago winter, and I eventually ran a long :extension cord from the fraternity’s pantry to a sign and then to the :car. I didn’t get the idea it was designed to mount under the hood, :but I slid it in there anyhow, with the cord coming out of the grill, :and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the :extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once :evert 2 weeks or less. The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full. : :I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the :circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little :neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 :seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that :way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped :maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it :still works fine 35 years later. Why’d you set it to 12v? I had a housemate who tried to sell me his trickle charger for $2 when he moved, but I refused. Now I’m sorry I didn’t buy it from him! : :As the battery voltage rises, that opposing voltage automatically :slows the speed of charging I think. When there is no longer any lead :in solution, I think that decreases the (reverse) current :tremendously. So with a 1-amp charger, I didn’t really think it was :necessary to turn off the charger at any time. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ve :always wondered if they really have parts to turn off the charging, or :if it just stops because the battery voltage prevents further :charging. Anyone know? : :A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes :about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take :the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps :lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead :plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the :sulphate too is lost to the battery until the next time the battery is :largely discharged, it seems to me you might get it back. (When the :battery is new or charged, you have lead plates and the plates of the pposite pole sitting in sulphuric acid and water. To make the :electricity, iirc, the sulphuric acid dissolves the lead, leaving lead :ions and sulphate radicals dissolved in the liquid. This is reversed :when you recharge the battery, and iirc the faster one goes the more :the lead and sulphate can combine with each other and get buried under :plain lead. I’m forgetting something however, partly because I can’t :recall the other half of the reaction.) If the 1 amp charger will do the least damage I should get that one instead. I couldn’t figure that out reading the boxes. One reason the 1 amp wasn’t attractive to me is that it doesn’t have pincer clips. It has connectors with round holes you are supposed to put around the terminals on the battery. The idea with the 1 amp I saw at Kragen (Shumacher, I think) is that you mount it under the hood and just plug it in when the car’s idle, presumably in your garage. This would be sort of OK for me except that I have two cars and might want to charge the other battery sometimes. Also, come to think of it, I’m not so sure how good a contact you would get with just those thin pieces of metal with a 1/2 inch hole in them. Maybe I should just spring for one of the $60 models that is “automatic.” : :Often I start my car with a boost from someone else, and I use the :alternator to finish charging it. I used to have a built in ammeter :and the alternator charged a lot faster than 1 amp, and it would have :to be, because with good cables, one can start the car without :recharging the battery at all. Yet after one drives a half hour, the :battery will seem pretty powerful. So sometimes to slow the :charging, I turned on the heater fan and maybe the headlights too. :But with only a voltmeter and not an ammeter, it’s hard to know when I :go from charging at 4 amps to 1 amp or zero. And I was never sure if :I was slowing down the charging too much (I wanted it fully charged :when I arrived but no sooner) and I don’t much give a darn anymore, so :I don’t do that. : :that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a :car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). : :I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return :it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current :automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say :the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% :when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to :unhook it. : :Sounds fair to me. Does it say what happens if you continue to charge :after it is fully charged? It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally. : :It still passes current at a 50% rate, even when fully charged? Yep. I figure that what’s going on there is that the resistance of the battery doubles. Just a guess. : :Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the :automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last :longer if you keep it well charged. : :I think that is mostly because charging it too fast damages it. I’m :not sure if charging very slow, 1 amp, does any damage or not. Someone once told me that trickle charging won’t harm your batteries if you just leave them charging after they’re charged, but one of these boxes said that even a trickle charger will screw up your car battery if you let it keep charging, so I’m concerned. My impression is that for an “ordinary” car battery 1 – 2 amp is considered “trickle charging.” : :Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first :place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the :dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and :green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They :definitely stop the deposit formation. I forgot to mention that there is definitely … read more »
Response:
I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start.
I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. Pour some baking soda on it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red felt washers until after I did this. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery.
I think he meant, since it discharged deeply, but slowly, it should be recharged slowly. I don’t think he was talking about a trolling battery. He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe he can become president. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different
What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and
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(snip) Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, assuming that the clock is the only drain.
It is not just the clock. In modern cars, there is parasitic draw of a 100 mA or more with everything turned “OFF”. This current supplies “memory” functions for computers, radio, clock, alarm systems, etc. Depending on a variety of factors, a battery draining down to the point where it won’t start a car in a about a month is not unusual. I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that.
To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. (snip) The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full.
What keeps a battery from freezing is its state of charge; that is the acid concentration in a fully charged battery freezes at a much lower temperature than in a discharged battery. (snip) It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally.
Excessive charging causes the electrolyte to bubble and water to “boil” off. If acid level isn’t monitored and water added as necessary, the battery can be damaged. High-current-rate over charging can overheat a battery and damage it. Ed P — TO REPLY, remove “ersatz” from domain name in the “From” line above. This address alteration is to avoid spam.
Response:
-Posted and emailed- Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock,
I’m sure that is enough if you can get the car started. Ed’s convinced me that a month is enough (and everything else he said.) assuming that the clock is the only drain. : :You could also could take out the fuse that feeds the radio/clock when :the car is off and use a milliammeter to see how much it uses. I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy
Or Ed suggested measuring the whole car load. with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing that.
After I disconnected it when I was away for 4 days one Thanksgiving, and it started fine when I got back, I started doing that, and I did it for months. It was fine. In fact, total, I think I’ve done it for years. Off course I had the red and green washers. I looked into buying a switch, and at that size, there at least 20 dollars. Didn’t seem worth it. You should get the solar panel. Then, you’ll be done. Another thing you could do is buy a Battery Buddy. IIRC they were 40$ at JCWhitney but I paid 45 or 50 locally. When the voltage gets low enough, it disconnects the battery, and you have to push the big red button to start the car again. When you don’t need it for this car you can transfer it to another car. It goes between the + cable and the post, with one wire to ground. Whitney doesn’t have it anymore but they have something similar. But I know that Battery Buddy has worked maybe 100 times for me, and it still works well. Except for the last two months, I was always able to start the car just by pushing the red button. Ed reminds me of various memories. OF course the radio will forget the time and the stations. It also said that the computer will forget the best settings for the spark etc., but in terms of performance, I’ve never noticed a difference, in the 88 2.5L. It was only the radio that I had to reset. Back to the quality of the connection, corrosion, invisible to the eye, can get inside the battery terminal, or on the battaery post. You need a battery post brush, which will have two brushes, one for each task. AFAIC you can buy the cheapest one they have. You only have to use it about once a year, and/or when you suspect a problem, and it will last years. I used to be reckless and now I’ve been lethargic, so all my repair stories have a point where they reach a crisis. My car had been stalling or hard to start for 3 or 4 days, and a friend came from NYC for one night and had to catch the train to DC in the morning to be at a meeting, the reason for his trip, and he had to be on time. And on the way to the train my car stopped again and wouldn’t start. This time I touched the battery post for some reason and one was hot and the other cold. The cold one sounds like the bad one and the hot one full of energy. But it’s the other way around. The hot one had a bad connection and generated heat as the current was forced through. While my friend waited I had to take off the cable, which might even have been tightened on, dig out the brush from the trunk, and clean the post and the cable connection with the brush. But all this took only 3 minutes and the car worked for months after that. :and the car started all winter. Even when snow covered part of the :extension cord, I didn’t even blow a fuse. I often drove only once :evert 2 weeks or less. The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I
And like Ed says, a charged battery won’t freeze except at a much lower temperature than plain water freezing. Even a discharged battery has some things in solution and won’t freeze at 32 iirc. don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it shuts off when the battery’s full. : :I set it on 12 volts, even though I had a six volt battery, and the :circuit breaker (which looked like a white xmas tree light or little :neon light (with two conductors visible) tripped every 30 or 60 :seconds, I didn’t measure, then reset automatically and it worked that :way for at least 5 months. That means the circuit breaker tripped :maybe 250,000 times that winter. I still have the charger and it :still works fine 35 years later. Why’d you set it to 12v?
I’m sure because it didn’t work at 6. I didn’t have a meter then, so I didn’t spend much time thinking. I had a housemate who tried to sell me his trickle charger for $2 when he moved, but I refused. Now I’m sorry I didn’t buy it from him! : :A 1-amp charger will do the best job, the least damage, but it takes :about 24 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you want to take :the car you’re talking about, you’ll have to plan a day in advance. or jump it from your other car.) (I believe too fast a charge traps :lead sulphate under the lead which is being redeposited on the lead :plates. I think that is called spongey lead. That lead and the
I misspelled spongy and couldn’t find any hits in Yahoo. No E. The correct spelling looks like it rhymes with Wong Lee. If the 1 amp charger will do the least damage I should get that one instead. I couldn’t figure that out reading the boxes. One reason the 1 amp wasn’t attractive to me is that it doesn’t have pincer clips. It has connectors with round holes you are supposed to put around the terminals
Mine has clips. You could cut off the holes and put on clips although even at RS, they might be 2 dollars a pair for big enough to go over a battery clamp. on the battery. The idea with the 1 amp I saw at Kragen (Shumacher, I think) is that you mount it under the hood and just plug it in when the car’s idle, presumably in your garage. This would be sort of OK for me except that I have two cars and might want to charge the other battery sometimes. Also, come to think of it, I’m not so sure how good a contact you would get with just those thin pieces of metal with a 1/2 inch hole
Thin is probably ok. in them. Maybe I should just spring for one of the $60 models that is “automatic.” : :that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a :car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). Someone once told me that trickle charging won’t harm your batteries if you just leave them charging after they’re charged, but one of these boxes said that even a trickle charger will screw up your car battery if you let it keep charging, so I’m concerned. My impression is that for an “ordinary” car battery 1 – 2 amp is considered “trickle charging.”
definitely :Maybe your battery shouldn’t be discharging that fast in the first :place. Is it clean, no white powder? It can discharge through the :dirt on the battery. I’ve bought, for about a dollar, those red and :green battery post washers. Is there a down side to them? They
:definitely stop the deposit formation. I forgot to mention that there is definitely some corrosion at both terminals. A lot more at one terminal than the other. I know I should clean off that corrosion, but I don’t know how. I guess I could take off the connection cables, and clean the connections off with a wire brush and some slowly running water. Or maybe I should pour some baking soda on too to neutralize any acid.
Do that first. I don’t use running water after the wire brush. If I do anything I blow the dust away, whle being certain to close my eyes first. I don’t know what I *should* do. ? I assume there’s sulphuric acid causing the corrosion (?). Other than the corrosion, I see no evidence of current passing over the battery top.
But that’s plenty, assuming I understood you that the battery discharges when it is disconnected at one post. But maybe corrosion is evidence of passing current, I don’t know.
I’m not saying that, not all the time, but your battery goes dead. Of course at the top we decided the car itself could do that. So you should clean it but don’t assume that will fix it. There’s an “eye” that you’re supposed to use to see if it’s charged, “green” or “dark”, but I’m colorblind (total green blind), so that’s no use to me! : : :I’ve never had any experience with a :car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. :Thanks. : an : :
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…He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe
he can become president… Hey – watch it! 8^) …What do you mean, Your costco was out…
I didn’t know that’s what they were calling it these days, but isn’t that what Bill Clinton got in trouble for? 8^) — Bill Putney (to reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the first letter of the alphabet)
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: : : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you :sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, :unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. I’ve been leaving it disconnected for something like 8 months. Probably drove it 5 or 6 times during this time, each time around 20 miles, mostly on the freeway and then disconnected the battery by removing the clamp from one of the battery posts. So, I guess that would suggest that either there’s a drain even while disconnected or the alternator’s not supplying enough charging current, something I hadn’t considered. But there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration. : Pour some baking soda n it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you :don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty :with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge :it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then :wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the :baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get :the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red :felt washers until after I did this. Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the clamps? : :My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge :the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said :it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), :Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. : :I think he meant, since it discharged deeply, but slowly, it should be :recharged slowly. I don’t think he was talking about a trolling :battery. He just had his words mixed up. If he does this a lot, maybe :he can become president. : :Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have :another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much :more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I :get? : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different : :What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there (Costco) already. : :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : : : :remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
Response:
: snip) : : Obviously a clock will run down a battery eventually. The question is : how long? I’ve been driving it 20 miles every 6 weeks. I don’t know if : that’s enough to counteract the effect of the drain from the clock, : assuming that the clock is the only drain. : : : :It is not just the clock. In modern cars, there is parasitic draw of a 100 mA r more with everything turned “OFF”. This current supplies “memory” functions :for computers, radio, clock, alarm systems, etc. Depending on a variety of :factors, a battery draining down to the point where it won’t start a car in a :about a month is not unusual. : : : : I have a multimeter and guess I could measure that current, if I can get : at the fuse. It’s kind of a hassle to do that. I’m really not unhappy : with just pulling the cable off the battery. Which brings up the : question: is it OK to just put that cable on like I’ve been doing, twist : it back and forth a few times (I have it pretty snug) instead of : cranking on it with a wrench. I’ve been doing that, and it’s possible : that the battery doesn’t charge as well without having that clamp tight. : My mechanic thinks I should tighten it up, but I haven’t been doing : that. : : :To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : Really good idea. I have a couple of multimeters and can do this test. One analogue, the other digital. I think either will work. What concerns me is that the battery went dead even disconnected. I figure there’s either a drain across the top between the terminals or maybe my alternator isn’t supplying a decent charge while driving 20 miles every 5 or 6 weeks. snip) : : : The boxes say that a frozen battery won’t take a charge. I think a : trickle charger will keep a battery warm, though. The boxes say that. I : don’t want to keep a constant current, but the 1 amp charger says it : shuts off when the battery’s full. : : :What keeps a battery from freezing is its state of charge; that is the acid :concentration in a fully charged battery freezes at a much lower temperature :than in a discharged battery. It’s not a concern where I am. It rarely freezes and when it does, it’s usually a light freeze. : : snip) : : : It doesn’t specify what will happen. Quote: “WARNING: Overcharging will : damage the battery.” That makes me nervous. Maybe I should return it and : get the 1 amp charger. It’s supposed to stop charging when it’s fully : charged. It’s slow, but I’m not in a hurry, normally. : : :Excessive charging causes the electrolyte to bubble and water to “boil” off. If :acid level isn’t monitored and water added as necessary, the battery can be :damaged. High-current-rate over charging can overheat a battery and damage it. My battery is “Maintenance Free” and I don’t think there’s any way to add water, but I could be wrong. There’s nothing like those caps or a cap strip that fits on the top like the batteries you can add water to. Maybe I should use the 2 amp setting rather than the 6 amp setting when charging this battery, if that will minimize overheating or the tendency to deposit sulphate on the lead plates, as Meirman has suggested can happen when charging at too high a current. It may not be an issue with this charger, since its maximum is 6 amps. I was reading a car battery FAQ and it said you can charge at up to 1% of the CCA, which for mine is 875. 1% of that would be almost 9 amps. However, if it’s better to charge it slower and I’m not in a hurry, I can use the 2 amp setting. The instructions that came with it didn’t suggest this in any way, however. The make it seem like you’d only use the 2 amp setting for small batteries – “Motorcycles, Snowmobiles, lawnmowers, or maintain charge in audo, truck, RV’s.” Actually, here’s their chart to guide you in selecting the charge rate: Charge Rate Charge time: Recommended Hours Uses 2 AMP 3-8 Motorcycles, 12 v only Snowmobiles, lawnmowers, or maintain charge in auto, truck, RV’s 6 AMP 6-8 Trolling motors, 6 or 12v recreational vehicles automobiles, trucks, vans Why they would have 6-8 hours for 6 amps and 3-8 hours for 2 amps kind of escapes me unless it was a typo or unless they thought you’d only use 2 amps for small batteries in the first place. And what’s a “trolling motor”? This chart would almost suggest that I can charge it at 2 amps and not worry about overcharging it, but it doesn’t say that. If you can “maintain charge in auto” doesn’t that mean you can’t overcharge at that rate? : : : :Ed P
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – : : : :I’ve been doing that but :the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it :wouldn’t start. : :I missed this, that you’ve been disconnecting the battery. Are you :sure it is clean? If it is still going dead while disconnected, :unless the battery’s bad, I sort of doubt it. I’ve been leaving it disconnected for something like 8 months. Probably drove it 5 or 6 times during this time, each time around 20 miles, mostly on the freeway and then disconnected the battery by removing the clamp from one of the battery posts. So, I guess that would suggest that either there’s a drain even while disconnected or the alternator’s not supplying enough charging current,
Right. Another story. I was in NY and I had reason to believe my charging current wasn’t adequate, but as usual I did nothing (although when I put on a new belt or have one put on, I always save the old one in the trunk, in case the new one ever fails.). I didn’t look at it but I drove from NYC to Chicago, and then to Indianapolis, Columbus Ohio and in the middle of the night, I was hooking up with the Pa. Turnpike near Pittsburgh. The lights had been dim, so I stopped in a big service plaza just before gettin on the turnpike. The car wouldn’t start, and the fan belt was litterally hanging on by a thread. It had worn all the way through except for one strong strand the thickness of button hole thread. I was about 30 feet from the service bay. I don’t remember if we pushed it in, or he jumped me and I drove in, or I just took the belt out of the trunk and installed it where I stood. I started the car maybe 40 or 50 times on that 6 or 7 day trip, and they took a little longer then than now (big v8’s) so I must have been charging it some all that time, but I’m pretty sure it was undercharged even at the start of the trip. something I hadn’t considered. But there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration.
We don’t know that it is deteriorated. I’ll admit that I think any discharging of the battery is bad for it (of course to avoid that you could never use it) and any full discharge is definitely bad. But I’ve had more than one of them down to dead at least 20 times and still used it for a year or two afterwards. BTW, they use hydrometers to directly measure at least some characteristic of the battery. As things get more reliable, it seems like a waste of money to buy a moderately good one ($10? just guessing), but those little ones with 5 colored balls are hard to find and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the flat surface below the fill tube for each cell. I think it is mostly the water that evaporates and less so the acid. ) Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. : Pour some baking soda n it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you :don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty :with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge :it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then :wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the :baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get :the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red :felt washers until after I did this. Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the clamps?
There probably are none. Few places put them on for you. (I don’t go to many shops and I have the least amount of work done that I can get away with. I think someplace in NY or Chicago offered them once and I took them. But my sample in the last 19 years in Baltimore is pretty small. It includes 3 gas stations, pep boys, K-mart, Firestone, 2 other shops, Jiffy Lube, three other tire places, three muffler places, two convertible top places, one body shop, two transmission shops, and I think that is it. Plainly, a lot of these places don’t service batteries at all. And I think only pep boys ever replaced a battery for me. Other times I just buy it and put it in myself because I don’t want to wait in line. I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still working. : : :My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different : :What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers
I get it now. It’s so obvious I don’t know how I missed it. for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s
They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, or that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more scared of stangers. What I really like is when a young pretty woman gives me a jump. It’s happened a couple times. I really admire them, compared to all the other females. It does seem a little harder to get one now, but it’s hard to judge. The more crowded some place is, the harder it is to get aride when hitchhiking, and I’m a little tired of this and probably more impatient when waiting. I hadn’t needed one for more than 7 years until the last month before I bought the new car. If I had bought it when I should have, I wouldn’t have had to ask. I don’t mind asking. I like meeting friendly people. But I was annoyed that I let my car fall apart. Anyhow, I don’t think it took more than 5 minutes one time and no more than 10 minutes the other time. Plus I had to hail a friend before he drove away in the middle of the night to do it on a third occasion that month. I’m not going to reinstall my battery buddy until I start having trouble of one sort or another. also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there (Costco) already. : :chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and : : :
remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
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A trolling motor is a small outboard motor. It’s great to use when you are fishing.
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Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out there on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the cigarette lighter socket.
Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage — Rickety
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: Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out :there : on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t : overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the : cigarette lighter socket. : : : :Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage I don’t park either car in the garage, but they don’t get tons of sun either. $100 seems like a lot for a charger, and I don’t remember encountering a solar car battery charger. Solar is attractive to me, and I’ve got a mind to look into solar panels for my roof, partly because my roof is conveniently configured for an array of panels.
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: something I hadn’t considered. But :there is that corrosion, and I think it’s been getting worse. Maybe that :signifies that some current has been passing over the top of the :battery, I don’t know. The battery was bought new around 4 years ago, I :guess. It’s not had a full charge on it for most of the last 2 or 3 :years, and maybe this has accelerated its deterioration. : :We don’t know that it is deteriorated. I’ll admit that I think any :discharging of the battery is bad for it (of course to avoid that you :could never use it) and any full discharge is definitely bad. But :I’ve had more than one of them down to dead at least 20 times and :still used it for a year or two afterwards. : :BTW, they use hydrometers to directly measure at least some :characteristic of the battery. As things get more reliable, it seems :like a waste of money to buy a moderately good one ($10? just :guessing), but those little ones with 5 colored balls are hard to find :and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of :dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use :distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the :flat surface below the fill tube for each cell. I think it is mostly :the water that evaporates and less so the acid. ) : :Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the :proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. Far as I know, there’s no way to put water in this battery. I could be wrong. It doesn’t have the caps on top. : :: Pour some baking soda ::on it, and then pour some water on that, slowly enough so that you ::don’t wash the soda off quickly. If it bubbles, your battery is dirty ::with material which I think can conduct electricity (and discharge ::it.) Keep pouring the water slowly until it no longer bubbles. Then ::wash it off with the rest of the water. (The pros say to mix the ::baking SODA and water first, but I’m too lazy to do that. Try to get ::the whole top of the battery. I wouldn’t put on those green and red ::felt washers until after I did this. : :Unless I’m mistaken, there’s no felt washers. Where are they? Under the :clamps? : :There probably are none. Few places put them on for you. (I don’t go :to many shops and I have the least amount of work done that I can get :away with. I think someplace in NY or Chicago offered them once and I :took them. But my sample in the last 19 years in Baltimore is pretty :small. It includes 3 gas stations, pep boys, K-mart, Firestone, 2 ther shops, Jiffy Lube, three other tire places, three muffler :places, two convertible top places, one body shop, two transmission :shops, and I think that is it. Plainly, a lot of these places don’t :service batteries at all. And I think only pep boys ever replaced a :battery for me. Other times I just buy it and put it in myself because :I don’t want to wait in line. : :I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would :give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve :been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace :them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to :remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that :cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But :as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still :working. The washers prevent acid leaking out? :: :: ::My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different :: ::What do you mean, Your costco was out. :) : :What I meant was that the Costco didn’t have any car battery chargers : :I get it now. It’s so obvious I don’t know how I missed it. : :for sale. I usually go there every 6 weeks or so, often as not when I :drive one of my cars. Kinda two birds with one stone. I’ve been eyeing :their battery chargers, and when I went there the other day specifically :to get the charger, they didn’t have any! They had some deal where you :get a 3 in 1 power station free if you buy 4 Michelin tires. Neither of :my cars need tires at all and the power station can’t even be used as a :charger, as I make out. It’s a DC power supply and you can plug it in :and use it to jump start, which is cool, but it’s a heavy monster. It’s : :They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t :even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder :to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, r that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more :scared of stangers. That 3 in 1 is a monster and heavy. A little hard for me to imagine someone carrying it in their vehicle. I decided it wasn’t something I wanted although I could use it. You can’t get everything you COULD use… I was listening to Click and Clack a few weeks ago and they pointed out that a lot of people nowadays are afraid to give people a jump because it’s said to pose a threat to their car’s computers, which didn’t used to be an issue before the days of computers in cars. My computer is of very little use and only works partially. It just does things like keeping track of miles/hour, trip length, junk like that. It doesn’t do any of those crucial things like gas mixtures, etc. My car actually has a carburetor, one of those finicky Mikuni’s. Now the fuel injected cars whose fuel injectors are regulated by the car’s computer may be suseptible to damage if they give a jump to another car. Of course, they could disconnect their battery, but that’s a hassle. :What I really like is when a young pretty woman :gives me a jump. It’s happened a couple times. I really admire them, :compared to all the other females. It does seem a little harder to :get one now, but it’s hard to judge. The more crowded some place is, :the harder it is to get aride when hitchhiking, and I’m a little tired f this and probably more impatient when waiting. I hadn’t needed ne for more than 7 years until the last month before I bought the new :car. If I had bought it when I should have, I wouldn’t have had to :ask. I don’t mind asking. I like meeting friendly people. But I was :annoyed that I let my car fall apart. Anyhow, I don’t think it took :more than 5 minutes one time and no more than 10 minutes the other :time. Plus I had to hail a friend before he drove away in the middle f the night to do it on a third occasion that month. Around here (Berkeley, CA, and environs) it’s gotten pretty hard to get a ride, hitchhiking. That’s been my experience, but I haven’t tried in quite a few years. I used to hitch with my bike over a bridge and usually had to wait a 1/2 hour or so. I guess I better do something about my discharged battery. It isn’t good to leave it discharged, I gather. Maybe I’ll give it the 2 amp charge today. : :I’m not going to reinstall my battery buddy until I start having :trouble of one sort or another. : :also a 260 PSI compressor, but I bought an AC tire inflator there Costco) already. :: ::chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and :: :: :: : :remove the QQQ or not you are posting the same letter.
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I’ve got 8 cars/trucks and 5 trickle chargers. I’m happy. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I went out to my ‘83 T&C yesterday and it wouldn’t start. I use the car rarely, and most times to just give it some exercise, hopefully once a month, but actually probably more like every 1.3 months (20 miles, mostly freeway). My mechanic told me that I should unhook the battery cable so the clock doesn’t drain the battery. I’ve been doing that but the battery still has been getting weaker and weaker and yesterday it wouldn’t start. My mechanic told me that when I took it to a Kragens and had them charge the battery (for free) the quick charge could fry the battery. He said it should be “deep cycled.” It’s a Sears DieHard Gold (M36090), Maintenance Free, not really what I think you call a deep cycle battery. Anyway, I figure that it’s best to get myself a battery charger. I have another car (Mazda 1997 4 cylinder, 626), and don’t use it all that much more lately (that could change). What kind of battery charger should I get? My Costco was out, so I went into Kragen and they had 4 or 5 different chargers from a 1 amp trickle charger you can mount under the hood and that’s supposed to shut off automatically, to chargers that will start a car and shut off automatically (around $60 or more). I bought the $30 charger, and haven’t used it and could exchange/return it. This thing (Shumacher SE-82-6) is manual (won’t shut off current automatically) and will supply 6 amps or 2 amps. The instructions say the current supplied (shown with a meter) will subside by around 50% when the battery is fully charged, and that’s how you tell when to unhook it. Should I get something else, say the 1 amp trickle charger or one of the automatics? The manual for this charger says your battery will last longer if you keep it well charged. I’ve never had any experience with a car battery charger and would appreciate the advice of people who have. Thanks. Dan
– George H. McDowell Wichita, Kansas http://www.carnut.com/ http://www.georgemcdowell.com/
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:To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones. Dan
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Are you sure this battery is not near enough dead? If it’s been left in a near-discharged state for a while, the plates probably have a good sulfate coating by now. Whether that causes the charge rate to drop so quickly I don’t know for sure, but I guess the sulfate coating causes an increased internal resistance. -=- Alan – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – :To check for EXCESSIVE total parasitic draw, you need an ammeter that reads :about 10 – 15 Amps full scale. You must disconnect one battery cable and insert :the meter between the cable and the battery. The 10 to 15 amp meter will have :sufficient capacity to allow various timer circuits — such as the courtesy :lights — to activate and time out; with a 10 – 15 amp meter normal parasitic :draw will not be visible (or only barely visible) on the meter scale. : :To measure the actual total parasitic draw, set the meter on a range that can :measure about 200 mA but use a jumper lead to bypass the ammeter for sufficient :time (perhaps 90 seconds) to allow all timer circuits to time out. Be sure :courtesy lights and any under-hood light are OFF. : I cleaned the terminals and charged the battery at the slow rate, 2 amps. I came back in about an hour and was shocked to find that the charger indicated a total charge! That is, it said the rate was well under 1 amp, the sign that a full charge had been taken. There was nothing to do but disconnect and see if it would start. It did, but I couldn’t tell how much oomph the battery has. I tested parasitic draw and it’s drawing 12.8 milli amp with the ignition off, etc. That’s with the battery connected, of course, which I’m not doing. I figure that with 1 hour charge at 2 amp giving it that charge, it would discharge to the former state if I left the battery connected in 6.5 days. I really don’t know what’s up with the charger saying it was fully charged after an hour of what you’d have to call trickle charging. I wonder if I should take it back and get one of the more expensive automatic ones.
Dan, I question whether the charge indicator on your trickle charger is a reliable indication of full charge. The best measure is to check the specific gravity of the battery acid, if that is possible. If the battery is sealed but has an “indicator eye” that shows a full charge then that is satisfactory. But neither of these indicators tells whether the battery is any good. For that you need to do a proper battery load test. By proper load test I mean a type recommended by the car or battery manufacturer. When I was a GM dealer mechanic years ago, this was a sore point with GM for warranty claims. The proper procedure called for first charging the battery until the “eye” showed green and then conducting a load test as follows: Draw 300 amps for 15 seconds. Let battery rest for one minute. Draw battery’s specified load test current (printed on Delco batteries) and record voltage after 15 seconds while load is still applied. As I recall, a good battery had to maintain at least 9.6 volts at temperatures of about 70 degrees or above. If the battery couldn’t be charged to produce a green eye, it was bad and shouldn’t be further tested. Back then, many mechanics had a battery testers that only drew 75 amps. These were not adequate to do a proper test. Around here in Northern Virginia, many auto parts stores will test a battery for free. I don’t know how good the test equipment is that such stores use. Also, in my experience a severely discharged battery may need *hours* on charge to fully recover; even on a shop charger. It is my opinion that the you give a marginal battery the best chance to rejuvenate by slow charging for all day or more. When charging a car battery, you are attempting to reverse a chemical process. When dealing with an old battery or one that has sat in a discharged state, the chemicals may resist this reversal process. Bottom line, if you have doubts about the condition of the battery, leave it on the trickle charger for a couple of days and then have it load tested. It is also a good idea to test the charging system output any time you are diagnosing battery problems. However, testing voltage is not enough. A good way to test alternator output is to use a clamp on ammeter at the battery while putting a load on the system with a battery tester. Hope this helps, Ed P — TO REPLY, remove “ersatz” from domain name in the “From” line above. This address alteration is to avoid spam.
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:and won’t tell you an awful lot. And then I have to be careful of :dribbling battery acid out of the hydrometer. (don’t forget to use :distilled water for batteries, until you see the miniscus and not the :flat surface below the fill tube for each cell. I think it is mostly :the water that evaporates and less so the acid. ) : :Chrysler especially, at least in the old manuals, talks less about the :proper voltages and more about the proper specific gravity. Far as I know, there’s no way to put water in this battery. I could be wrong. It doesn’t have the caps on top.
Not even very big flat ones, just two of them? When they first came out with maintenance-free batteries there was no way to add water, but the next big group had thes low visibility caps. Maybe that’s because they weren’t truly maintenance free, but at the time, I thought it was because the maintenance free idea wasn’t quite as good as it sounded. After all, there still has to be an air vent, a gas vent, somewhere, and if you overcharge a maintenance-free battery, won’t it still lose water? I’m guessing that was true and the test conditions for the first batch of them just weren’t as tough as real life conditions with guys like me who take months to start worrying about car problems. Or I might be quite wrong. : : :I think the washers are great, but I was hoping someone else would :give an opinion. I don’t know why I need someone else’s opinion, I’ve :been using them for maybe 25 years, although I rarely if ever replace :them and I even transfer them from one car to the next if I had to :remove the battery cables for any reason. All this for things that :cost a dollar a pair and probably aren’t more than 2 dollars now. But :as long as I don’t see the white stuff, I figure they’re still :working. The washers prevent acid leaking out?
No, they have chemicals in them that neutralize whatever leaks out. I think different parts of the leakage are attracted to, or different reactions take place, at the two posts, so the red washer is for the + and the green is for the -. (Of course they could be the same, anb they’re just soaked in baking soda, and they’re trying to impress us by having two colors, but my guess is they are really different. (Baking Soda is Bicarbonate of Soda, NaHC03, but that doesn’t tell me, knowing as little as I do, if you can mix it with water, soak the felt washers in it, and let it dry out and still have baking soda in the felt. I don’t know. And I still think the red and green are different. If you don’t have a lab and can’t afford to send them to one, you could tell if they’re different by putting each of them in your mouth. But I don’t have the nerve to do that either. :: :They’re pushing those, either because people are loners now who don’t :even want to ask someone for a jump, or perhaps because it is harder :to get a jump these days. People think their cars are more fragile, r that’s just an excuse because they’re more selfish or even more :scared of stangers. That 3 in 1 is a monster and heavy. A little hard for me to imagine someone carrying it in their vehicle. I decided it wasn’t something I wanted although I could use it. You can’t get everything you COULD use…
That’s true, especially with a LeBaron trunk. I’m sure it’s intended for carrying in the car. I think some ad mentioned that. There were no pictures of that on the label? For home you are better off with a 6 or 8 amp** charger, which will last forever. The battery in the thing you’re talking about will die eventually and I bet a replacement will little sold and therefor expensive. I say 8 amps because I’m assuming one who buys the monster is in a hurry. I guess it does have the advantage that it can, I gather, start the car without charging the battery, but the alternator will do that afterwards at a pretty high rate. I know what it is. I would always be afraid the battery in the thing had failed, and I didn’t know it. With the charger, I figure it will last until I’m 150. I was listening to Click and Clack a few weeks ago and they pointed out that a lot of people nowadays are afraid to give people a jump because it’s said to pose a threat to their car’s computers, which didn’t used to be an issue before the days of computers in cars. My computer is of
I heard that show too, but they never really said if the fear was warranted, did they? I was waiting for them to say. It poses a threat I suppose if you connect them backwards, as it did/does to the diodes in the alternator. I’ve gotten or given 100 or 200 jumps in the last 35 years, and I’ve only connected it backwards twice, once about 20 years ago. It didn’t hurt my car, which was the weak one, and I checked and my friend’s car had no problems either. Then once about 6 weeks ago in the ‘88 with the computer, I connected the charger backwards, watched it give sparks several times. Didn’t seem to hurt the running of the car. very little use and only works partially. It just does things like keeping track of miles/hour, trip length, junk like that. It doesn’t do any of those crucial things like gas mixtures, etc. My car actually has a carburetor, one of those finicky Mikuni’s. Now the fuel injected cars whose fuel injectors are regulated by the car’s computer may be suseptible to damage if they give a jump to another car. Of course, they could disconnect their battery, but that’s a hassle. Around here (Berkeley, CA, and environs) it’s gotten pretty hard to get a ride, hitchhiking. That’s been my experience, but I haven’t tried in
That’s depressing. They’re supposed to specialize in pinko commie stuff like that. I still pick up hitchhikers when I see them, but not if there is a busline on the street they’re standing on. Mostly intercity and I only go out of town so often. My last trip to Youngstown Ohio last August, I picked up one for about half the trip. He helped me push the car when I was so low on tran fluid that it wouldn’t go into gear. (I forgot to buy more. Eventually I dug through the trunk and found another quart.) When it was time to drop him off, I had to run around this small town looking for a place that sold beer, because he couldn’t sleep without it, and then I took him to the back of a walmart where he could sleep. He was very nice. Normally, whether I’m hitching or picking people up, I never tell them where I’m going or how far. That way I can get out or put them out gracefully, by telling them our paths are diverging, and not antagonizing anybody. Although if they really are up to no good, it probably doesn’t matter if one antagaonizes them or not. quite a few years. I used to hitch with my bike over a bridge and usually had to wait a 1/2 hour or so.
Not too good. I once hitched with a bike, in fact the date is easy to recall because the week ended in New York with the bicentennial fireworks, July 1976. I thought it would be impossible, or I’d only get picked up by people with pick up trucks. I got about 5 rides, all I needed and none had pickup trucks, just cars. One was a girl who said she had never picked up a hh before, but my bike made me seem trustworthy. Indeed the bike still worked, but the temps were about 99 and my roommate had said we would ride in the morning and evening and sightsee in the middle of the day. We never did any sightseeing so I left him and his cousin and I hitched from the coast of VA. to the first train station on which I could put the bike. I think that was Richmond but the last girl drove me all the way to dc. I guess I better do something about my discharged battery. It isn’t good to leave it discharged, I gather.
I’m not convinced. I don’t see why once it is down, it matters how long it stays that way. I don’t think it is like a suit stuffed in a corner where the wrinkles set in. I’m not even sure suits get worse after the first humid day. But I’m guessing and you should still fix it. Maybe I’ll give it the 2 amp charge today.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – : Why don’t you look into the host of solar-powered trickle chargers out :there : on the market? Make sure the one you get advertises that it won’t : overcharge the battery. Most are under US$100, and they plug into the : cigarette lighter socket. : : : :Then don’t park it for eight weeks in a darkened garage I don’t park either car in the garage, but they don’t get tons of sun either. $100 seems like a lot for a charger, and I don’t remember encountering a solar car battery charger. Solar is attractive to me, and
Whitney has one for 30 dollars 1 1/2 watts, that looks like mine, although I would like to think I paid less or got more. It’s probably enough for you. It would at least extend your one month time to 2 or 3 months. Try to set the surface of the panel perpendicaular to the sun’s rays, so you’ll get more rays. Also one for 77 that is 5 watts. Also a multivoltage one for charging cellphones and small batteries and car batteries for 35, and on another page 15 watts for 152 up to 45 watts for $486 (big one includes 3 15 watt plus a required controller) The first one says “will not charge a dead battery” but i”ve always wondered if that is true, say,if you gave it a month, why wouldn’t it? I think they are afraid people will complain if it takes a month. They also have three jump starters, one with the brand name Jump-N-Carry and another whch says “Carry your own emergency power supply anywhere you go.” I’ve got a mind to look into solar panels for my roof, partly because my roof is conveniently configured for an array of panels.
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Basically, it has a small fan and a reservoir of water, and it uses evaporative cooling to direct a flow of cool air across your neck.