#9: Re: Batteries/Charging Systems
Author: eaglebeak,  Posted: Tue Dec 18, 2007 11:38
pm
Lonestar had some great advice on
batteries, and maybe I can add a little to boot. There's all sorts of
chargers from trickle, smart, floaters, or maintainers, but Lonestar had
very good advice about simply making a little regimen of going out and
hooking whatever charger you have up about once every week or two and
leave it hooked up overnight - then remove it. Keeping a battery always at
full charge will keep it fully charged OK, but the plates will slowly
sulfate up over time; and a few months later, you'll have a fully charged
battery with very little capacity - which gives you a few seconds of
moderate cranking, then click click click.
The batteries that live
the longest are the ones that get regular "exercising" where they're
pulled down by starting and a little running at low speed with the lights
on, then slowly charged back up again to a full charge again with a 20
minute ride at moderate speed or spending the night on a trickle charger,
maintainer, or whatever. If you don't load one down regularly during the
storage months and charge it back up again, you'll find it not to be as
whoopie as it was a few months earlier regardless of what kind of charger
you kept on it.
There's a few actual "smart" chargers available
(think mine is a Vector) that have a 2.2 Amp maximum charge setting, that
will shut completely off and stay off after the battery reaches full
charge. The decent ones have an "exerciser" or "rejuvenater" setting that
does just as I've described in that it slowly discharges the battery down
to about 1.5V per cell (around 9V), then trickle charges it back up to
full - and shuts off. If you're storing the bike over the winter and don't
want to add excess moisture by firing it up every week, you need only to
hook the smart charger it up about every two or three weeks for 24 hours
and run it through an exercise cycle to keep a happy battery.
EB |