Battery Minder Plus Experiment Concludes

[DBMaster]

I placed an East Penn manufactured Everstart Maxx into service in my 2012 Mazda3 (Skyactiv) in August 2020. I added wiring with an SAE connector inside the bumper so I could easily connect my BatteryMinder Plus on a weekly basis. It's a 1.0 amp maintainer/desulfator. The routine was to leave the charger connected until it switched to maintenance mode, indicating the battery was fully charged (initially this would take less than a day, but as the battery aged it would take 2-3 days.)

Fast forward to this week, four years and ten months later. Even though the battery still read 13+ volts it lost its starting capacity as evidenced by slow cranking and a voltage drop to less than 9V when starting.

Some anecdotes on this forum indicated that such routines might double the life of the battery. In my case, I did get longer service than I ever have from a FLA battery, but I'm not sure it was worth the trouble. At best, I think I MAY have increased the service life of the battery by 20-25%.

What has your experience been if you conducted similar experiments?

 

[doitmyself]

I have not conducted any experiments. Up here in the great white north, my various vehicle, OPE, and ag. batteries tend to last 6 to 10 years without any extra charging care. I do put my OPE/Ag. batteries on battery minders one or two times over the winter to avoid freezing, if that counts.

Your one data point test supports the hypothesis that Dallas hot weather kills your batteries, even with extra care. My inclination is that it is not worth the effort in both our climates. If one likes the hobby aspect of toying with this stuff, have at it!

I hope others in your climate chime in with test experience. Thanks for sharing.

 

[gman2304]

No experiment but my wife’s Lexus ES350 has had my old Schumacher 1.5 maintainer hooked up off and on ( roughly biweekly) for years and her FLA Lexus battery was 8 years old in April. Notice the red sticker date. Having said that, I’ll be replacing it soon.

 

[Vercingetorix]

Why not install a 12v to 12v charger and not worry about plugging in?
https://optimate1.com/product/optimate-dc-to-dc/

 

[chexxers]

using a C-tek muse my FLOODED interstate was in 10 yrs + removed just because + my AGM NAPA prolly died from alternator failure in 8 yrs, prolly an east penn battery as the plant is about 70 miles from me. i also used it on several motorcycles that were sold due to my age NOT the batteries all over 5 yrs + one OE in my victorywas 8 yrs + doing well!!

 

[DBMaster]

As doitmyself mentioned, it's likely the heat that limits battery life here. The longest lasting battery I experienced was an Optima Red Top in my 1989 Accord. That car had the battery located in one of the hottest areas in the engine compartment. The best I ever got from FLA was 3 years. The Optima lasted 6 and retained much better cranking power than FLA near the end of its service life.

I think I'll leave this battery alone and see what I get from it with no effort.

On a related note, my Walmart only has JCI made batteries at present. At $139 it beats the pricing on similarly rated batteries from other retailers. I paid $99 for the one I purchased in 2020. Inflation.

 

[f355spider]

My 2 cents:
I am in a mild climate...I have been using battery tenders for over 15 years intermittently, but got more religious about it during the pandemic in 2020 due to my cars sitting more and now I use them constantly. My "fun" cars are constantly on battery tenders and daily drivers are plugged in at least two or three times a week overnight.

Over the past three years I have switched to using only Battery Minder and Pulse Tech as they seem to have lots of good feed back here. I have seen a difference in battery capacity and state of charge/state of health readings using these brands over others, such as Battery Tender, or Granite Digital Save A Battery brands. The algorithm of Battery Minder and Pulse Tech do seem to be better at reducing sulfation or whatever and improve performance. I had batteries that were declining, in spite of daily use of a battery tender that improved when switching to using a Battery Minder (2012 or 128CEC2). I have one of the Battery Minder wall wart units from Harbor Freight, it is a 1 amp unit and so small, I think they are really best for long term use, not for overnight, as you found, they can take quite a while to reach float charge.

What I have learned with using the Battery Minders longer term, is they need to operate on the float mode for weeks at a time to "restore" a sulfated battery. When I switched my two declining batteries to Battery Minder, these are on daily drivers, so I plugged them in every night for three months and they regained over 150 CCA capacity. Even the Battery Minder instructions state their desulfate does not work overnight...it takes weeks, as it is a gentle process.

If you are only using your Battery Minder to recharge the battery, it is not getting a chance to desulfate. Leave it on as much as possible. I would get a larger unit if possible, like a 2012 which is 2 amps, it will usually reach float mode in four hours on my cars. The 128CEC2 is selectable 2, 4, 8 amps but they recommend the 4 amp for multiple batteries (which is how I use it) and the 8 amp setting for Odyssey batteries.

As far as Optima red top batteries...they used to be awesome (used them for 20 years), but I went through three of them over 5+ years, each started leaking, though the batteries performance was still excellent. I no longer use or recommend Optima red tops. I hear their plate type yellow batteries are fine, but I am just done with the brand.

I have had good luck the past few years with Clarios AGMs (Interstate, AC Delco or Walmart), mostly the German and Korean made ones.

 

[repairman54]

My BatteryMinder results currently are an Odyssey in my HD still cranking fine. It was installed in '11. A OEM Yuasa AGM that mounts sideways in one snowmobile, a '13 was fine all last winter. Sister sled has a 10 yr old Yuasa in it. Both sleds are a 3 cyl. 1200cc 4 stroke EFI not a 2 stroke twin so battery gets worked.
These are currently my oldest batteries still in service.
Mower U1 batteries over 4 yrs old still performing fine, and they are notorious for being poor quality or not last too long. One mower does plowing duty in winter.
All the batteries stay installed in their equipment with quick connects and get stored in unheated areas seeing winter temps down to -20f also. When ever machines get parked they get plugged in and for me that attests to the desulification of them.
I currently have 9 BM units in play.

 

[D1dad]

Gotta be the heat. A 5 yr old maxx is still running my nephew to work and back everyday and never sees a charger.

 

[mitsuman47]

Another vote for heat being the battery killer here.

Anecdotally, trunk-mounted batteries last substantially longer than those located in the engine bay.

For my vehicles with batteries in the engine bay, I usually raise the hood after I pull into the garage.

 

[Donald]

I placed an East Penn manufactured Everstart Maxx into service in my 2012 Mazda3 (Skyactiv) in August 2020. I added wiring with an SAE connector inside the bumper so I could easily connect my BatteryMinder Plus on a weekly basis. It's a 1.0 amp maintainer/desulfator. The routine was to leave the charger connected until it switched to maintenance mode, indicating the battery was fully charged (initially this would take less than a day, but as the battery aged it would take 2-3 days.)

Fast forward to this week, four years and ten months later. Even though the battery still read 13+ volts it lost its starting capacity as evidenced by slow cranking and a voltage drop to less than 9V when starting.

Some anecdotes on this forum indicated that such routines might double the life of the battery. In my case, I did get longer service than I ever have from a FLA battery, but I'm not sure it was worth the trouble. At best, I think I MAY have increased the service life of the battery by 20-25%.

What has your experience been if you conducted similar experiments?

You should have used a BatteryMinder with temp compensation. Like the model 2012. In DFW with high temps you really need temperature compensation.

I have two model 2012 and one 128.

 

[D1dad]

I just realized that your charger was the northern tool version. Not to rip on it but I have 2 of those and absolutely don’t trust them. I’ve had a brand new battery come off of a Pulsetech or battery minder and charge for 3 days and never go into float mode while zapping the battery with 14.6 volts the whole time. I gave them to my son in law for his side by side and snowmobiles and he gave them back. Same issue. I’d invest in a Pulsetech or a BM 2012. Whole different world and algorithm. I’d keep an out this week on the Pulsetech xc450, they usually discount them which puts it at $50. The xc400 is always $69.95 which is a good choice as well.

 

[DBMaster]

^Got it. I've read a number of posts here about the Northern Tool version, though, I thought that it had worked well since I bought it around 2019. Based upon the advice from this thread I do think I'll watch for something better to go on sale.

Doesn't matter much at this point, but this is what I have. It does have the temperature compensation feature.

 

[f355spider]

^Got it. I've read a number of posts here about the Northern Tool version, though, I thought that it had worked well since I bought it around 2019. Based upon the advice from this thread I do think I'll watch for something better to go on sale.

Doesn't matter much at this point, but this is what I have. It does have the temperature compensation feature.

View attachment 287284

The algorithm is different than the other Battery Minder products and BM will tell you that when you call tech support. It works though.
I have used it with a bluetooth data logger to watch what it does. It can take a looooong time to reach float mode, I've observed up to 20+ hours on occasion. Usually less, like 7 or 8 hours. Not sure if this is because it only outputs 1 amp, or part of the algorithm. BM tech support says the algorithm will allow it to remain in charge mode up to 72 hours before it will time out and stop. It is not designed to charge a fully depleted battery, as it will likely timeout before reaching full charge.

Also, the float voltage is pretty low...around 13.2vt, and the temperature compensation is very mild...where my 2012 or 128CEC2 will adjust up or down .5vt or more in compensation based on ambient temperature...the 12117TC will barely nudge .1vt or .2vt under the same temperature conditions.

 

[Brons2]

Now that we have 2 EVs, I'm thinking the next time we take a long trip out of town, I probably need one of these for the 12V battery. You'd think they'd last longer with energy from the high voltage battery used to feed it, theoretically almost a built in battery tender. But that's definitely not the case in our Ford EVs, they have a reputation of rarely lasting more than 3 years, which would be worse than what we got on our prior ICE vehicles.

 

[f355spider]

Now that we have 2 EVs, I'm thinking the next time we take a long trip out of town, I probably need one of these for the 12V battery. You'd think they'd last longer with energy from the high voltage battery used to feed it, theoretically almost a built in battery tender. But that's definitely not the case in our Ford EVs, they have a reputation of rarely lasting more than 3 years, which would be worse than what we got on our prior ICE vehicles.

Get one with a good desulfation mode as part of the algorithm. I'm finding this more important than just topping the battery off regularly with a battery tender. Battery Minder and Pulse Tech have good feedback here as actually working and my experience, at least with Battery Minder, backs that up. If they are flooded or plate type AGM batteries the 2012 is a good one. If they are Odyssey or Optima AGM, then the 2012 AGM.
I got mine from this place, free shipping no tax.
https://www.batterystuff.com/batter...2-amp-charger-maintainer-desulfator-2012.html

If you want a fancier model with lot of versatility, this one: (I have a couple of these now)
https://www.batterystuff.com/batter...r-and-lithium-charger-maintainer-128cec2.html

Pulse Tech:
https://pulsetech.com/collections/4-amp-battery-chargers
Wait for a sale...I got a couple of the XC540s for like $50 each. But the XC400 for $70 is not a bad deal either.

 

[f355spider]

Why not install a 12v to 12v charger and not worry about plugging in?
https://optimate1.com/product/optimate-dc-to-dc/

View attachment 286942

The only issue is you need a separate 12vt power source installed near the main battery. Will the charger allow both batteries to charge while driving? Is there any desulfation mode taking place?

As I mentioned previously, desulfation seems more important than just maintaining state of charge. While batteries kept at a full charge are less likely to sulfate as quickly, all batteries seem to sulfate eventually.

Perhaps if one doesn't want to plug in a battery maintainer or desulfator, an on board desulfator might be a better solution?
https://pulsetech.com/products/pp-12-l-powerpulse-12-volt-battery-maintenance-system
The only issue I see with these, is they consume some power, so unless the car is daily driven, or plugged in regularly, it could drain the battery sufficiently to cause a "no start" situation.

 

[ripcord]

Contrary to popular Internet lore, the primary cause of death for the majority of automotive batteries is NOT sulphation. It's primary plate erosion and corrosion. Every time a lead acid battery is discharged and charged, a little bit of lead is lost from the positive plates. Preventing this is the main benefit of keeping a maintenance charge going on a battery. When a lead acid battery is held at a full charge you eliminate a lot of those charge/discharge cycles.

Sulphation it's a real thing but more so on heavily neglected batteries. It's the number of charge/discharge that does most of the damage.

 

[f355spider]

Contrary to popular Internet lore, the primary cause of death for the majority of automotive batteries is NOT sulphation. It's primary plate erosion and corrosion. Every time a lead acid battery is discharged and charged, a little bit of lead is lost from the positive plates. Preventing this is the main benefit of keeping a maintenance charge going on a battery. When a lead acid battery is held at a full charge you eliminate a lot of those charge/discharge cycles.

Sulphation it's a real thing but more so on heavily neglected batteries. It's the number of charge/discharge that does most of the damage.

I have personally seen two batteries that were clearly declining, in spite of use of a battery tender several nights a week. (Granite Digital Save a Battery 50 watt)
I switched to using a Battery Minder brand on both batteries with a sulfation cycle and both batteries over the course of several weeks improved their state of charge and state of health numbers. One 6 year old AGM recovered over 100 cca on my Ancel BA101, and continues to maintain that level since about January of this year. The other, a 3 yo flooded about 70 cca. I'm not sure what other explanation there is. I continue to plug them into the Battery Minders, but less so now, perhaps two or three times a week.

No doubt all batteries wear out eventually from use, but clearly their life can be extended to some extent from using a battery tender with a sulfation cycle, as charging alone was not enough in my experience.

 

[D1dad]

The only issue is you need a separate 12vt power source installed near the main battery. Will the charger allow both batteries to charge while driving? Is there any desulfation mode taking place?

As I mentioned previously, desulfation seems more important than just maintaining state of charge. While batteries kept at a full charge are less likely to sulfate as quickly, all batteries seem to sulfate eventually.

Perhaps if one doesn't want to plug in a battery maintainer or desulfator, an on board desulfator might be a better solution?
https://pulsetech.com/products/pp-12-l-powerpulse-12-volt-battery-maintenance-system
The only issue I see with these, is they consume some power, so unless the car is daily driven, or plugged in regularly, it could drain the battery sufficiently to cause a "no start" situation.

Funny you mention that. My son in laws just ordered one for his f150 that inexplicably keeps destroying batteries. Thus far, all under warranty, but his 36 months is up. I’ll let you know how it ends up.