dead battery

I have had two deep cycle batteries in my garage for a couple of years. Both would not hold a charge or not charge. A friend of mine told me he had a battery charger from duracell, that “reconditions” batteries. He had a vexilar (gel) battery that had sat for a year, and came back to life whith the reconditioning. I filled one of the batteries last night and set the charger to recondition. It is putting out over 14 volts.. I’ve never heard of reconditioning with a charger. Is this new or am I behind the times a little? Does/has anyone else used one before? Also what can a charger do to bring a battery back?
Thanks,
Dan

keep us posted on this!!! I have heard of conditioning while the charger is in the maintaining mode, but for the battery to come back to life!!! well thats a new one…..

Yes we have one in the shop it DOES work .if the battery doesn’t have a bad cell it brings them back to life. Its a 24 hour process. Now don’t ask me how it works but it does.Might have to ask Chappy or a electronics genuis!!!

where is your shop and how much does it cost? i have two in my boat right now that are just not holding a charge for very long.
seperate question on battery maintenance: are there some yearly or 6 month things I should be doing to my batteries to keep them fresh. I have a good charger from cabelas that charges and then conditions and maintains but I was out the other night and used the trolling motor off and on for about 3 hours and it sucked it down to the point that I couldn’t start my main motor. thankfully I had the old starting battery in there and still connected to the charger so I just switched the motor cables and were good to go. But that trolling battery is not more than 1.5 yrs old. Any thoughts.

Many of the new “smart” chargers have this built in although it has to be selected and turned on.

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Battery sulfation takes place when a Lead Acid Battery discharges. The lead from the plates combines with the electrolyte (dilute sulphuric acid) to make lead sulfate. When the battery is recharged this process is reversed however, some of the lead sulphate will crystalise on the lead plates. The deeper the battery is discharged, the more the lead sulphate is likely to crystalise acting as an insulator and reducing the plate area in contact with electrolyte. Over time this build up of lead sulphate crystals will kill the battery.

The lead sulphate crystals are firmly attached to the lead plates and so it is not easy to remove them and recondition a battery. As more and more crystallisation occurs, the voltage required to shift the crystals also increases. But, if you were to put high voltage through the battery it would overheat and potentially explode. However it is possible using high voltage pulse conditioning to dissolve the lead sulphate back into the electolyte. By pulsing the high voltage, only the sulphate crystals are affected and the battery does not heat up.

Every lead acid battery has a resonant frequency if around 2 to 6 megahertz. If a pulse of sufficient energy electricity is sent into a lead acid battery, rhythmic beating of the plates will cause the crystalline deposits to be broken up and the sulphate returned to the electrolyte solution. This process can take a matter or weeks during which time the battery must be trickle charged (in parallel with the desulphator). Strangely the voltage measure across the battery terminals will drop as the desulphation takes place as the internal resistance of the cells is reduced by the clearing of the crystals on the lead plates.

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Any thoughts.

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I found this article helpfull

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where is your shop and how much does it cost? i have two in my boat right now that are just not holding a charge for very long.
seperate question on battery maintenance: are there some yearly or 6 month things I should be doing to my batteries to keep them fresh. I have a good charger from cabelas that charges and then conditions and maintains but I was out the other night and used the trolling motor off and on for about 3 hours and it sucked it down to the point that I couldn’t start my main motor. thankfully I had the old starting battery in there and still connected to the charger so I just switched the motor cables and were good to go. But that trolling battery is not more than 1.5 yrs old. Any thoughts.

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FIRM up by Mille Lacs ,Braink did u get that from Chappy!! And yes u can buy a charger with this feature!!

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but I was out the other night and used the trolling motor off and on for about 3 hours and it sucked it down to the point that I couldn’t start my main motor.

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Micah, I don’t know of anyone that recommends running a trolling motor and main motor starter off the same battery.

After reading the above, I wonder if you have a deep cycle battery that is made for a trolling motor or just a regular marine starting battery…big difference.

Maintenance?

1)Clean the cable ends and terminals at the first sign of corrosion.
2)Check the water level in the spring, summer (weather in the 90’s and the regular non automated chargers will boil the water out) and fall.
3)Never use tap water…aways distilled
4)Keep them charged when not in use.

It sounds like you have a good on board charger…

I bought a three bank on board charger from Jolly Ann as a matter of convenience. It is a “smart” charger that reads the battery and goes into the trickle charge after the battery has a full charge.

What I didn’t know that I was getting was extended battery life…by not over charging and less maintenance by not having to add water…hardly at all. The other benefit is the batteries say in the boat all year. No more lifting 3 big guys out, hauling them to the basement and come spring doing it all over again. A charged battery won’t freeze.

BTW…Chappy told me all of the above.

I have to correct the statement

“A smart charger will trickle charge after a battery has a full charge,”

Actually it should shut off completely and only come back on every so often to bring it back to full. Trickle indicated there is still amperage being put to the battery, which over time is bad and will kill a battery.

I have a shumacher ship and shore charger, it has the option to detect a battery that needs a the plates cleaned automatically. Works nicely, you can see the voltage when the battery is charging and when it’s off, when it’s charging it something like 14.4V and off it’s something like 12.6V.

I stand corrected.

Thanks for the info. mudshark and BK. The battery was dry and sitting on my garage floor, I just refilled it. My friend needed his charger back for his work. I was able to run it through one cycle of reconditioning. It showed 40% charge. I think it will recover with more time. After doing somme reading on the internets, it seems it can take up to a month, if the battery has alot of build up. I am going to northern later today to see what they have for chargers with this feature. Not really in my budget for right now, But it may save me from buying a new battery sooner than I need to. I like the features the duracell had. It shows volts, amps going in and % charged. They want $70 for it at Northern tool. Might be tough to do, going to see if they have others that might fit the budget better. I’ll update, once I know how far it will come back. but even 70% would allow me to use it for a starting/electronics battery. I’m so glad Al Gore invented the internet. I’ve learned alot from IDO and other places.
Dan