I need a new battery charger. I use it for my boat battery, which is an AGM ODYSSEY TROLLING Thunder Marine Dual Purpose Battery, my Corvette which tends to be a good weather car, and my Tundra which sometimes sits a bit too long. Even My Corolla XRS when I screw up and leave the radio on too long.

The one I had, has a “refresh cycle” which seems to have helped really seemed to have helped. I have seemed them referred to a “desulfation cycle” on some battery’s chargers. I would like a charger with that feature.

My internet search seems to think NOCO GENIUS10 and CTEK MXS 5.0 are the best.
What do you guys think? Is there really a difference?

 

CTEK is better than NOCO IMHO. I have 3 CTEK battery maintainers. One rebranded CTEK that came with my C8, one CTEK MXS 5.0 for my C3 and one CTEK MXS 5.0 for my Goldwing. I used to have a Noco for my Goldwing but the battery kept dying and I figured out that the NOCO was not doing it's job. Granted NOCO may have improved over the years but I've switched to CTEK 3 years ago when I bought my C8.

JT

 

I have a battery minder. I find I don't use it too much. But if the battery dies, I need a charger.
The refresh (desulfation) also seems to help. but I have read mixed reviews about if it is good for the battery.
Also, I don't need a heavy duty 50 amp charger. Something in the 12 amp range would be what I was looking for.

 

I have the Cteck that came with my C6 but I got a NoCo that I use for everything else. Except for my C3 the rest of the fleet including the C6 have agm batteries. The NOCO that I have is one of the cheaper units but I like the way it shows how low the charge is when you start and you can watch it go up from there. It works great as a tender but not as a charger. For thatI have an old school Schumacher one.

 

Just out of curiosity, I plugged this into CHAT GPT. The two it came up with are

Victron Blue Smart IP65 Charger Best overall. I think the fact that the boat has an AGM.

It also liked NOCO Genius10 as a good choice

The NOCO is probably the practical winner for most owners with mixed battery types. The Victron is the “buy once, cry once” choice.

 

I have a CTEK MXS 5.0. Works great! It has brought back a few batteries that I thought were toast. It will work with AGM batteries, but not LiFePo4.

 

I have the odessy and a battery tender both are great on agm batteries.
I like hearing people cuss out the AGM batteries because they let him get too low and their regular battery charger won't charge them back up. I tell him I'll take them. Then I take him home, put them on my Odyssey and they come right back. I can't believe people don't understand that batteries take different kinds of chargers.

 

You need to use a charger that is compatible with your spiral bound battery if that is what you are using+. I had a Red Top Battery and using a regular battery charger was a no/no. The spiral bound batteries need more filtration of all electrical noise inside the battery charger. One of the chargers actually had a battery inside of it to help filter out the noise.

If you have a Yellow Top or the Red top you will need a special charger for them. Ask the manufacturer's tech support yourself if you don't believe me. They all required special chargers made just for them. Of course the chargers would work on many different chemistry batteries fortunately.

Personally when it comes to chargers I prefer the cheap Chinese ones that have 7 levels of charging and can completely charge a battery. I paid $50 for a 7 stage smart battery charger on Amazon and it works great. It even charges up to 20 amps on 12 volts and has 7 stages of charging which does a good complete job.

Today I keep a 15 watt solar (Photovoltaic) panel plugged into my parked car and it is always at 100% state of charge which helps the battery last longer. I have a small cable hanging in the wheel well that connects to the solar panel and charges it right up. The solar panel and the charger built in will not overcharge your battery and they are small and easy to handle. The panel and the charger are $23 on Amazon and they are a great way to keep your battery charged without any extension cords.