Battery Charger Advice

Time to purchase a battery charger to keep my RX-7 battery fresh over the rest of the winter. Any suggestions on a good (and cheap) charger?

Thanks,

Ray

Do you want a charger or a tender? They are 2 different things. If you just want your battery fresh while the car is in storage, you want a tender. I buy the cheapo HF battery tenders. I have one on my Esprit (Esprits are a battery killin' machine) and one on my bike. I had a few extra batteries and kept tenders on them. Of 3 that were around for about 5 years, 2 were still useable when put into service.

most anything english, italian or modern BMW will kill a battery quick. I agree with the good Doc.. the HF tenders are great

Those cheapo HF chargers do work great. They seem to be a straight trickle charger so they could over or under charge, but that does not seem to happen. I do use a Battery Tender for my bike though since it is a rather small battery and would be more susceptible to overcharging.

+1 on the HF maintenance chargers. They went on sale for like $7 and I bought 5 of them. I used to buy a battery for my riding mower every spring, with one of those connected during down time I haven't replaced one in 4 years. The Abomination and Casper the J-H wear them as well plus I keep one extra battery in the shop charged just in case.

I have a Schumacher 2/10/50 amp charger, it was something like $40 a few years back and so far has been everything I have required (mostly charging/jumping other people's cars stashed at my place).

Thanks everyone! It looks like I will need both...since I currently have neither.

-Ray

HF here I come....lol

My family got my father this for Christmas to play around with, its now his new favorite battery charger:

big solar panels

I would be tempted to try one of these: little solar panels

I do have a 'batterey tender' and it has kept batteries alive, great product but I want to power it from the sun now!

I have an automatic charger from NAPA. It has a 2-amp, 10-amp and 60-amp (jump start) setting. It also switches from lead acid to gel cell batteries.

It also does 6-volt and 12-volt.

I also have a battery tender, which I leave on the Miata.

anybody have any experience with the solar ones?

I have one of the HF solar battery tenders on my 86 Truck. I put it on around 2001 on a used battery and just laid it on the dash. That battery finally died last fall. I'd figure out some way to put one on the Esprit but it is kept in the garage. The Truck stays outside.

A friend of mine was way up in the enlisted ranks of the Army, a Master Gunner, if you know what that takes. He said that when the Army started putting the solar battery tenders on all their tanks, trucks and other equipment, their battery replacement costs dropped through the floor.

It turns out that there is a Harbor Freight 20 minutes away from me. That place is dangerous. I picked up the $7 maintenance "charger" and a $20 charger. I also now have a list of about 15 items that I just need to get.

Watch your voltages on cheapie chargers.

I may have to get at least one of the solar chargers.. with two cars that eat batterys (bmw and saab and all their electronics) it might be a good investment for the car I am not driving that week

Sears sells a nice one that I use--it's a charger/tender and it was $29.99, IIRC.

I'll juice up my Civic (that's in storage) every other month or so and my Civic with a power drain in it (that I'm too cheap to repair) get's topped off a couple of times a week with it.

When it's fully charged, the indicator light goes green and it stops charging.

+1 for the cheap Harbor Freight milli-amp trickle charger; though chargers in general freak me the berkeley out.

I'm gonna make one for myself:

http://autospeed.com/cms/A_110354/article.html

I use the Battery Tender brand junior chargers. They are small and work great as a float charger. http://batterytender.com/product_info.php?products_id=4&osCsid=370c644d3ea0b92d793ecaba13dd7383 The retail is around 40 bucks, but you can get them at Eastwood and other places for around 24. They've worked great for me. I love HF, but was a little worried about the quality of their cheap float chargers, so bought the battery tenders. I think I'll pick a few of the HF float chargers up, now that I've see a lot of people on the board have had good luck with them.

mad_machine wrote: anybody have any experience with the solar ones?

I have this battery attached to the deep cycle spiral gel cell battery on my trailer to power my emergency separation brakes and my Warn winch. It's been there for 2 years now and I've had no problems.

how about just ebaying up a VW Solar battery topper... they are like $8

http://www.vintageprojects.com/general-workshop/battery-charger.html Make your own like your dad did.

racer_ace wrote: It turns out that there is a Harbor Freight 20 minutes away from me. That place is dangerous. I picked up the $7 maintenance "charger" and a $20 charger. I also now have a list of about 15 items that I just need to get.

If you think that's bad...then I shouldn't tell you about their email list that sends out coupons every week, huh?

Oops...

Clem

And this morning the coupon email included one for one of their trickle chargers for $5.99.

Clem

Yeah, best to catch the HF tenders on sale. Note that as mentioned, a tender is not a trickle charger. I've also blown a couple of the HF tenders, so keep that receipt and don't put one on a dead or low battery.

If the battery is in good condition, fully charged and disconnected, it should be just fine sitting over the winter without any battery tender; I've been doing this in Minnesota for more than 30 years without problems. They discharge more slowly in cold weather anyway. If it makes you feel better you can put it on a regular charger once a month or so, but it shouldn't be necessary.

I should mention I do have a namebrand Battery Tender. I tried it once, and the damn thing cooked my car battery dry. Maybe I was just the lucky guy who managed to get a defective one, but I don't have a real high opinion of them.