Vector Battery Charger = Junk

[JHZR2]

So since my BMW's battery went down to 8.8V, I figured Id get a real battery charger. I went to pep boys to see what they had, and they has a nice 15/10/2 battery charger with desulfation, equaliziation, alternator test, etc. functions. I stopped at wal mart and saw a schumacher, so I bought that one too. It does not have the equalization feature, FWIW.

I put the vector on first. It wouldnt charge, and the display had bad connections so parts of the display would blink as the connection was made and lost.

So, Vector batter chargers seem to be junk.

Any experiences???

Thanks,

JMH

 

[wapacz]

Probably means the battery voltage is to low for it to charge. At least that is what I found with a different brand of electronic battery charger, when I tried to charge a totally dead a battery.

 

[JHZR2]

schumacher went on and charged right up. Ive been monitoring the battery with a multimeter for the past few days, and it tends to sit at about 12.2V. Its not undervoltage...

 

[edhackett]

12.2 is a bad battery. A good battery should hold right at 12.8 with no load.

Figure 1 - Battery State of Charge
Charge Voltage Voltage Specific
Level (12v) (6v) Gravity
------ ------- ------- --------
100% 12.7 6.3 1.265
75% 12.4 6.2 1.225
50% 12.2 6.1 1.190
25% 12.0 6.0 1.155
0% 11.9 6.0 1.120

Ed

 

[brianl703]

For clarification, the 60mA parasitic draw isn't going to drop your battery's voltage all the way to 12.2V. I can play the stereo in my Saab quite loudly for about 20-30 minutes before the voltage drops to 12.2V (and that's measured with the stereo playing+the current draw of all the other stuff the Saab leaves powered up with the key in the ignition--about 8 amps total draw).

 

[Gary Allan]

Originally Posted By: wapacz
Probably means the battery voltage is to low for it to charge. At least that is what I found with a different brand of electronic battery charger, when I tried to charge a totally dead a battery.


That's a distinct possibility. I bought my son a charger. It read some type of fault code (light) when he tried to charge a battery. He figured the battery was toast and bought another one ..which also discharged in the project Cherokee he bought (really beat - but good hard parts). Come to find out the charger won't work on a dead battery

 

[brianl703]

I've used a 13.8V power supply to charge car batteries. That works even when the battery is dead.

 

[Gary Allan]

I've used a wall wart to trickle charge batteries. Not recommended, but it's effective and everyone has one laying around.

 

[The_Jeff]

I've found some chargers are "dumb" on the lower, say 2 amp mode, and will start charging a battery that way even if they refuse on a higher mode. Give 'em time and you can flip a switch up to a fast charge.

 

[JHZR2]

well I used the schumacher last night until it read 86% capacity and then turned it off.

The battery was reading about 13.1V last night, but it needed to rest so the charge could redistribute.

This morning, it was reading at about 12.6V, but the charger was claiming I was at 90% charge.

Ive set it up at a lower rate to finish it up today... hopefully it works out...

Suprisingly, Ive seen the charger telling me it is putting 15.7V into the battery! My fluke claims it is 15.56V.

Im shopping now for a group 49 AGM battery - given that the application is an OEM trunk-mount, AGM VRLA is the better bet (no offgassing), and there is a thread for a group 49 battery, so that will buy me some additional reserve before things go wa wrong...

Or so I think...

Thanks,

JMH

 

[doitmyself]

JHZR2,

Is the Schumacher the old transformer style or is it also a solid state "smart" charger? The reason I ask is that some have reported that the old style chargers sometimes work better on "dead" batteries vs. the solid state. I am looking for more information to confirm this.

I bought in to the propaganda about desulphation on the Battery Minder web site and bought one of their chargers for our Marine Deep cycle batteries at work.

So far, everything's good. But for an "old" geiser, it's hard to use a 2 pound plastic charger compared to my old 20 pound all metal vented unit!

 

[1sttruck]

My Sears charger works fine, and being a couple of decades old it's proven to be an affordable, durable product. I'll probbaly never have to buy another one.

 

[doitmyself]

Originally Posted By: 1sttruck
My Sears charger works fine, and being a couple of decades old it's proven to be an affordable, durable product. I'll probbaly never have to buy another one.


I also have an old Dayton/Grainger charger and have few problems with batteries.

The new smart chargers claim to increase battery life by desulphating (cleaning) the plates. And, they claim that they "read" the battery's condition and charge it at the best rate to prolong it's life. Then, instead of shutting down, it feeds the battery a variable low charge to maintain the battery at it's best condition (better than an on/off trickle charge), so they say.

How can you pass up those claims. I don't know how we ever survived before "smart" chargers. Batteries must have been failing everywhere.

 

[Steve S]

Load test the battery.!!!

 

[Steve S]

I worked on forklifts the battery chargers for electric forklift batteries advanced to a smart charger type of operation and they seem to be the way to ge as it cares for the battery with out tending to it.