I wanted to cry...

When I bought my vette I bought a battery with it. Battery immediately went bad as car acted completely possessed (engine would shut off going down road / dash would flicker on and off / etc. etc. etc.) Sometimes it wouldn't start... Completely freaky and took a little while to point finger at battery as I never suspected brand new battery would do that.

I vowed to never again have battery troubles like that. So I bought the most expensive battery I could fine. It was a sealed gel battery with 900+ cranking amps. Unfortunately, I lost my job and had to store the car for the past 2 years. I've started it up once a month but that wasn't enough to keep the battery fresh

I had to buy a new battery despite I hardly ever used the gel one. I know I should have put a special storage charger on it to keep the voltage up.

Does anybody have a trickle / storage charger they recommend? I know there's a lot of them out there... and don't want to buy one that's going to burn my house down after 2 months.

Thanks!!!!

 

Best advice I think I could give is to forget about the charger and just disconnect the battery between starts. A good battery should easily last months without a load. I'd also suggest to not start the car for only a few minutes in the garage, if you're going to start it then drive it for a while also. If you'd rather not put a wrench on the terminal every time you can get a disconnect switch

 

I was disconnecting the battery previously but it's a PITA to get my wrench in there so I gave up on it after a few months.

I do start the car for 15-20 minutes and run the AC at the same time. It get's driven about a mile every 3 months or so (down the road and back in my development).

I'm still looking for a trickle charger. Not sure what I think of the disconnect switch... Novel idea, but for 10 bucks more I can get a charger at the parts store. Not sure what's best setup though.

 

Hi there I was in the same situation as you. Except I kept my car on a float charger all the time with a new red top optima battery and never had a problem. Now I am driving the car every day and battery is like new. I used the charger from Harbor Freight for 2 years, no fires no issue and it's 5 dollars. A lot of members use the same one, that's where I got the idea. On my boat I disconnect the batteries since I dont run it but every couple of months. Honestly if you arent going to drive it you could just disconnect its much easier. What issues are you having removing one of the terminals!?

Also I would suggest not letting the car sit, for more than a month at a time if you can. And you should really drive it when you do, more than a mile do laps in your neighbor hood take turns get it up to speed if you can to keep all of the parts in service. good luck.

 

I use the Battery Tender Plus on all my vehicles and haven't had a battery problem since. I bought two of them and just keep rotating from each toy every once and a while. I leave them on each one at least a week or so and change off. One failed battery and you have the price of at least two of these little chargers.

On the boat, I installed a MinnKota onboard charger. The bateries seem stronger and last alot longer. I was replacing the trolling motor batteries at least over other year. I am now on my third year with no problems so far.

Just make sure you get a fully automatic charger so it doesn't over-charge your battery. That will kill a battery faster than not using one.

 

Hi there I have a question, did you mean the boat charger that charges the trolling motor batteries while you are driving the boat with the main motor? I was told that would wear out the alternator, and it wasnt made to do that. I was also told good trolling motor batteries should last the entire day

 

Hey guys thanks so much for the fantastic references. I'll give those float chargers a try

 

Battery Minder model #12248 It's not only fully automatic, it has a de-suplhate function as well to extend battery life. Get the optional temperature sensor too.

I recommend it.

 

Wow, that looks like quite the charger. Seems to do much more than just work as a float charger? Have you used it to recondition batteries before?

 

I've had it for a little less than a year now, and I can hook it up and leave for days-on-end if I choose with no worries of overcharging/"cooking" my battery. After any initial charging, it usually goes into an automatic Float (maintenance) mode, depending on the condition of the battery being charged of course. I got the optional temperature sensor and it enables the charger to better tailor it's charge rate/modes depending on the ambient temperature. I leave the temp sensor hooked to my battery full time and whenever I hook the charger up, it has a separate plug-in lead that plugs into another lead on the charger. Can't make any mistakes.

The desulfation feature is nice, but it's really hard to say how much it actually extends the life since I don't have another battery of equal age to compare it to. I did a lot of checking around on most of the various brands and I saw a lot of positive reports on this one. The company makes a variety of chargers including one for aircraft batteries and I know how extremely picky the FAA and aircraft maintenance types are, for good reason. The desulfation technology seems to be pretty legit though as several other companies are using it as well. It's easy to use and so far very rugged and reliable. I really like it so far.