Charger with desulfator?

[TightLine]

Anyone know of an onboard charger that also desulfates batteries? I'm in the market for a new charger and was thinking of adding desulfators since my battery life isn't what I'd like.

Thanks,

Ray

[Ann-Marie]

Sulfating of batteries is typically a symptom of sitting for extended periods in a discharged state.  If you are using the batteries on a regular basis and charge ASAP after use, I doubt that you have a sulfating problem.

[Way2slow]

Don't know of an onboard but the BatterMinder Plus works great.  Cost about $45 and will take six to eight weeks to completely restore a battery.  

[RobDar]

Sulfating of batteries is typically a symptom of sitting for extended periods in a discharged state. If you are using the batteries on a regular basis and charge ASAP after use, I doubt that you have a sulfating problem.

Bingo! Ann-Marie knows her batteries!

You say your battery life is not what you would like...

First...are they ever?

Second...how did you get to sulfur? There are hundreds of less abstract causes of shortened battery life.

[TightLine]

Perhaps they are not sulfated. I'm about to replace my charger due to a flakey charging bank which is likely to be my problem with this set of batteries but more importantly, if I'm going to replace the charger and the batteries I want to do everything I can to setup for the longest battery life possible including desulfating.

Not knowing exactly what is going on with the flakey charging bank, it's conceivable that it was not fully charging the battery leading to sulfation. Further, if the battery wasn't being charged up enough to avoid sulfation, the rest of the series were likely discharging and potentially sulfating.

I am by no means a battery expert but my understanding is that sulfation starts occuring when batteries are drawn down to about 80% of their charge. I have no idea how long the battery must be at this state for sulfating to occur but I'm guessing there isn't a magic time frame and there are other factors involved (temperature, etc). I'm also under the impression that this is at least one of the reasons why you want to charge your batteries as soon as possible and that if done quickly, the charging process can remove the sulfates.

There are times however that I do not get my boat on the charger as soon as I'd like and I'd suspect are least minimal sulfication occurs even when I do although I have no proof. The boat is sometimes in the shop, I go camping and fish for multiple days without a charger, I fish in high currents and high winds. I've drawn my batteries down so they only move the boat at 2mph rather than the typical 3mph, forget to plug the boat in, park the boat where there is no power, etc, etc.

It just seems to me that desulfating wont hurt, so why not do it?

- Ray

[surfer]

Are you looking for a system you can intentionally not charge for the weekend or longer? And do you plan on repeatedly drawing it down to less than 30% capacity?  

[TightLine]

There are times when I do intentionally not charge for days when I want to fish (and camp) at a lake where I don't have AC availble to plug into.  That's not the norm of my fishing and not a goal unless there is such a system available(?). I suppose a small generator would help, but I already dislike the noise pollution from other's generators while camping. My thoughts are more along the lines of trying to keep my batteries in the best shape possible when I can't charge immediately.

Here's what I'm looking at so far:

1) 4 bank charger (3 trolling, one starting)

2) A on-the-fly charger which charges the trolling motor batteries when running the outboard (after the cranking battery is charged).

3) Solar/AC powered desulfator

I considered solar charging as well but the size of the panels, cost and the fact that I live in the Pacific Northwet negates practicality. Another possibility is to add charging from the tow vehical as well but I'm not sure how much I'd benefit from that unless I was doing a lot of traveling between lakes.

- Ray

[surfer]

Long battery life and not charging them for two or three days while runing them down is mostly contradictory from what I understand. I can appreciate you not wanting to add to noise pollution. I am the same way.

There is probably a way to get a quiet generator by the addition of a big muffler and a simple housing. I have seen both techniques used individually before with good results. Think how quiet your truck is compared to a generator. That is accomplished through mufflers. And your truck engine is much bigger than a generator.

I am not familiar enough with desulfators to say if that would be the better route. But everything I have read says it couldn't hurt. You may want to try it on your current batteries and see if it revives them.

Here is a chart to illustrate how deep discharges shorten battery life.

http://www.usbattery.com/pdfFiles/Avg%20Life%20Cycles.pdf

Here is an enormous amount of info.

http://www.batteryfaq.org/

Good luck.